Smallville The Caves
by IolantheAlias
Summary: Clark & Chloe go spelunking, but a kryptonite accident leaves Chloe sharing Clark's body. The two must work together to get back where they belong.


Chloe awoke. She gave a slight moan and instantly regretted it as a stab of pain went through her head. She had a tremendous headache. She felt like the muffler on an old car that had lost its holding clamps and had been dragged 10 miles down the road, sparking and scraping all the way. Her mouth was a desert, her tongue swollen and dry. Unfortunately, a cool breeze swept across her face, being extremely annoying as it kept her from falling back into the dark sleep from which she had just emerged.

She slowly realized that part of her discomfort was because she was laying on a rough stone floor. In fact, it was only a floor by courtesy – she was in the Kawatche caves and was sprawled on the irregular, rocky ground surface. Certain tiny and not-so-tiny nubbins projected into her body, becoming more and more annoying as she woke up more fully.

Taking the plunge, Chloe opened her eyes. Little light filtered into the caves, but there was a bright beam of sunlight peeping down through a crevice in the ceiling. The tiny beam gave enough reflected light to see pretty well, although the corners were dim. Chloe could not see into the edges of the cavern she was in. The bright sunlight sent a momentary stab of pain through her head, but she resolutely kept her eyes open. She rolled her eyes in their sockets, feeling the dryness and grittiness, and then blinked several times. This merely spread the grittiness around and didn't feel a lot better. Her vision still seemed pretty blurry.

She reached up to rub her right eye. Chloe groaned as sore muscles moved. She slowly stretched her right arm and hand, moving the fingers, hand, wrist, elbow, and finally the shoulder. She realized that she was lying on her side and her left arm was trapped beneath her.

"I've got to get up", she thought. She did the same stretch to her right leg, stretching and then relaxing toes, arch, ankle, calf, knee, and thigh. The muscles protested but gradually became less painful as she flexed and extended. Her back still felt tight. Grunting in pain, she rocked back and forth on the long axis of her body. She felt a stir of triumph as she managed to roll over onto her back.

Chloe lay gasping for a moment. What had happened? She had done an "intervention". Clark had recently broken up with Lana after being hypnotized by the blue jewel-wielding Simone. Despite knowing that his relationship with Lana would never work, Clark had fallen into a depression afterwards and spent a lot of his time just brooding in his loft. Chloe was worried about him, and had, by a combination of wheedling, persuasion, guilt-tripping, and almost physical force, had gotten him to come with her on an outing.

She took Friday off from her intern work at the Daily Planet, and planned to spend the weekend with Clark. She and Clark had been walking through caves near Smallville. Clark had feigned disinterest at the beginning of their walk, but later mentioned that he felt that the caves near the river would eventually connect to the Kawatche caves. He had a proprietary feeling about the Kawatche caves and wanted to know if there were other entrances or exits. Despite the brisk early winter weather, the caves retained a constant temperature of about 60 degrees Fahrenheit.

"Clark thought he could use his x-ray vision to map the passages." A memory came to Chloe of their talk before going into the caves. They had brought several flashlights, lots of extra batteries, and a small amount of food and water. "We were only going to scout a short distance from the mapped areas of the riverine caves."

A frisson of fear went through Chloe as she realized that Clark was missing. Was she alone? What had happened? "Clark!" she yelled. "Clark, where are you? Clark!"

Distorted echoes mocked her call, but Clark made no answer. She felt a small rumbling in the walls and floor around her at the sound of her voice. "There must have been a cave-in!" she realized. "Why? Clark wasn't using his powers – he wasn't punching the cave walls to make a tunnel, or using his heat vision to burn through anything. There must have been an earth tremor." She felt even more nervous as she realized that the room she was in was still unstable.

"Gotta get up, gotta get up!" she told herself. "C'mon Chloe, you can do this!" Her tortured muscles protested as she rolled onto her side, then onto hands and knees. Dust fell from her hair. She could feel grit and dirt on her face – she must have been near a rockfall. Slowly, she rose onto her knees, then stood, wobbling unsteadily. She put a hand out to the wall next to her, needing the support.

Something seemed odd. Was it due to the headache and the blurry vision? She seemed to be higher up than she usually was. She didn't recall the cave ceiling seeming so close to her head. She looked down at her feet, clad in white Nikes. "I thought I was wearing my blue shoes today," she said. Chloe looked at her feet, then moved her vision higher to her jeans-clad legs. Her legs seemed longer than usual. "Wow, I must be concussed – I'm seeing things!"

Something didn't seem right. Chloe didn't feel right, and it was a different feeling than the nausea and dizziness of the headache, and the catch in her throat when she breathed deeply, and the sore muscles. She looked at herself again – white Nikes, blue jeans, plaid shirt - - wait a minute. "I wasn't wearing a plaid shirt today!" Chills went through her as she looked at her hand, leaning on the wall. It definitely was not her own hand. She had well-groomed nails, today wearing clear nail polish. She spread her fingers, wondering in amazement at the amount of space from thumb to pinky. She didn't have short nails on long fingers and a large palm. She didn't have a hairy arm.

Chloe was starting to feel a little panicky when suddenly the pain in her head bloomed again, a dagger from her eyes right through to the scalp on the back of her head. The pain forced her back to her knees, and she fell to the ground, whimpering. She had had migraines before but this was worse than the migraines ever were.

Suddenly she had the oddest feeling in her head. She felt as though herself, her consciousness, was being pushed away. It was being crammed into a smaller and smaller area. It was like being trapped in the subway with no seats available and everyone forced into uncomfortable intimacy standing there, holding bars and straps. It was being on the beach on a steamy day with everyone's beach blankets taking every single square inch of sand. It was herself, her soul, being Play-Doh and being pushed into one of those tiny molds. It was maple syrup melting and filling each little square divot on a waffle. She felt herself being pushed smaller and smaller and began to panic in earnest.

"Aaah!" she screamed, and began pushing back. Whatever force it was pushing against her stopped its advance. Chloe didn't know how, but she got an impression of surprise from the advancing force. She pushed back harder, and the feeling of crowding, of congestion, of shrinking down, became less. The other force now seemed a little nervous, a little hesitant.

Suddenly Chloe felt herself advancing towards the other force. She didn't know how it was happening, but she could feel herself, her consciousness, moving towards the other force and the other force stopping its advance and waiting for her. She touched it.

She gasped with the sensation of "otherness". She only brushed against it but it was strange, alien. Something was in her own head and it wasn't herself! She rebounded back, as if her hand had touched a hot stove burner. Then slowly, she came forward again. She had a mental image of herself in a dark room, slowly walking towards an unknown object, an object shrouded in fog. She walked slowly into the fog and again came to the other. Trembling, she reached out with her hands and touched it again.

Chloe's eyes stared blankly as she used all her "processing power" in creating a mental image. In her head, it was like she a dark room. She slowly reached out and touched the other. It was like getting an electric shock. She fell back in pain, trembling. The other advanced slightly towards her. She was prepared this time and focused her will, seeing it as an invisible wall that kept the other from moving any closer. She realized that she could use the invisible wall as a "force field" or "gloves". Chloe put her hands behind the invisible wall, then forced them forwards. The wall of her will formed around her hands, a transparent glove of protection on either hand.

She reached towards the other. She touched it. This time there was no shock. She felt it. It was irregular in shape, smooth but lumpy. There was a strange sense of familiarity to the feeling. Moving slowly and carefully, Chloe imagined the force field glove on her right index finger thinning, becoming more and more transparent, and finally melting away. She touched the other with that bare finger. The shock knocked her backwards again, but as she reeled back, she also felt "Clark-ness". The other, a strong firm entity, felt like Clark. It could not be described. It was his strength, his muscles, his gentleness, his inner core of will, his scent, his laughing green eyes, his Midwestern voice, all together in a gestalt experienced not as each little bit, but as a whole.

"Chloe?" she heard in her head, not in her ears. It was Clark's voice, but thin, wobbly, strained. "Chloe?"

"I'm here, Clark!" she said out loud. She could not see Clark. Where was he? Her attention turned back to the outside world, she looked around again at the rocky cave. She was still sitting hunched over next to the cave wall. Again, her eyes were attracted to her Nikes and blue jeans, but further looking came to an end as she heard Clark's voice again. "Chloe?"

Chloe again made the mental adjustment to go "inside my head", as she thought of it. It was quicker this time to go to the dark room, set up the wall of her will, and plod across to the fog which she knew contained the other. The fog seemed a little thinner now. Again, she created the gloves, and resolutely walked forward into the fog. Somehow she could tell when she was approaching the other. It seemed as if her own soul became cramped, pushed in, as she neared it.

She approached it, the irregular shape with the feeling of "Clark-ness" to it. She poked at it with one finger, gloved this time. Suddenly the shape roiled. She backed up, watching it. Irregularities on the surface smoothed out, coalesced into a human shape. The crazed pattern of color (like an oil puddle on the ground after a rain, she thought) of its substances swirled around, gradually becoming blue on the bottom, red on the top.

"Chloe? Where are you?" Clark's voice sounded stronger now, less uneven. The voice was definitely coming from the shape that was the other. Chloe called, "I'm here, Clark", and looked at the shape. It was becoming more and more defined. It was definitely human. It was wearing blue jeans, a red T-shirt, and white Nikes. It was Clark.

Clark looked at Chloe and rubbed his head. _He's probably not used to headaches_, thought Chloe, a little resentfully. "Chloe? What are you doing here?" Clark said.

"What are you doing here?" she replied. "Where are we? What is going on?" Clark gave her a rueful smile. "The last thing I remember is being in the caves and hearing a rumble", he said. "I looked up and saw that the ceiling was collapsing. I tried to get to you and push you out of the way of the falling rubble. What happened after that?"

"I don't know. Don't tell me that you were knocked unconscious – I thought you were indestructible!"

"I usually don't get knocked out. Maybe I was at a bad angle trying to save you. It looks like you're ok."

"I don't know about that", Chloe said. "I'm really feeling funny. And are we really talking to each other, or am I hallucinating?"

"Why would you say that?" Clark said.

"Because I think I'm in my head. I don't think we're really in a dark room – when I woke up, I was in the caves and there was dust and dirt all over me. If I'm really awake, how did we get from the caves this dark room? The cave had light in it."

Clark frowned. "Good point," he said. "What did you do before? I was unconscious but I felt something touch me –it was like getting hit by lightning. It woke me up."

"I was feeling pushed down, cramped…" Chloe began. A figurative light bulb lit. "Clark, do you feel cramped?"

"Strangely enough, I do," he said. "I don't know how to describe it. It's like I'm being pushed sideways or backwards or into a smaller place than I would want to go." He unconsciously stretched out his arms and legs as he spoke, trying to deny with his body language what he felt with his mind.

Chloe said, "I think we're in a place that we've created by imagining it. I know how to get out. Take my hand, we'll walk out of this room and get out." Clark reached forward to take her hand.

"_She's really good-looking today – I hope she doesn't notice me looking at her breasts.__ Wow, Clark has good abs under that T-shirt, I'd sure like to touch him. I'm glad Chloe knows my secret, I can be myself around her. I feel safe with Clark next to me – I know he will protect me."_

They simultaneously dropped their hands. Neither said a word as they stared into each other's eyes. "What was that?" said Chloe. She held her hand up again and reached for Clark's hand. He didn't reach for hers. Their hands touched.

_I felt you. I felt you. _

"I think we're reading each other's minds!" whispered Chloe. Suddenly she blushed. She looked at Clark – he was blushing too. They stared at each other in silence for a moment, then Clark gave a shy grin. Chloe grinned back, wider, and suddenly they were both laughing. "Another item for the Wall of Weird!" said Chloe.

"OK, where are we?" asked Clark. "And how is this happening?"

"Either we've entered Twilight Zone territory or this is just another ordinary day in Smallville", Chloe sighed. "Is this just a hallucination? I'm going to metaphorically click my heels together three times and say "There's no place like home…" She opened her eyes. Nope, she was still in the Kawatche caves, she still felt crowded, and her body was aching.

She felt Clark's presence looming nearer and got a feeling of surprise from him. It was not the intimate knowledge of his thoughts, the electric shock of actually feeling him directly; it was more of an aura, a strong hunch, a "gut feeling".

"Chloe", he said carefully, "you just opened your eyes, right?"

"Yes, Clark", she said.

"Then why did my eyes open?"

Chloe looked at her hands again. Now she realized what was bothering her before, what she hadn't picked up on due to her headache. _They weren't her own hands._ The hands she saw were a lot bigger. The nails were shorter and not polished. The skin was darker than her usual pale shade.

"Ah, ah, ah, what's happened to me?" Her stomach clenched in shock. She started breathing rapidly and her heart was pounding. She closed her eyes.

Suddenly the feeling of "Clarkness" was stronger. It was as if he was standing behind her and holding her in his arms. "Chloe, Chloe, calm down. I think we are both in my body."

" In _your _body? Oh, oh, OK!" Chloe gave a weak smile. "Come on!" But she realized, her heart sinking, that it was true.

"I've always wanted to be taller," she tried to cover her panic with an upbeat remark. Gradually her heartbeat and breathing slowed down. Clark continued to support her. She turned and "looked" at him.

"You seem to be taking this fairly calmly," she said.

"Well, it's not the first time… Well, it is the first time I've shared but I've been in someone else's body before. I guess it's like they say, you can get used to anything."

"You've been in someone else's body before? Clark, I have to hear this story!"

"Chloe, you are such a reporter! Is the story all you think about?"

"Clark, I'm trying to keep my composure here, and not break down into a screaming fit…"

"OK, short version – you remember last year when I "wasn't myself"? I quit the football team for a week?"

"Yes, you were acting so different…" Chloe gasped as the light bulb went on. "You mean you weren't _you_ at that time?"

"Lionel Luthor had done something to pull a soul switch. He was in my body for several days before I could get things back to normal."

"_Lionel Luthor?"_ A stab of fear lanced through Chloe as she considered what Lionel could do with Clark's powers. Then a bigger shock ran through her as she realized that Lionel had been in the Torch office with her, asking questions about her part in his murder trial, what she would do if Lionel got out, etc. "Oh God, that was Lionel?"

Clark said, "It's over now. It's all ok. But you can see that I'm a little more used to these weird things than you are. You just report them -- but they happen to _me._"

Slowly, Chloe calmed down. "All right", she said. "This is Smallville, after all. What's life here without some weirdness?"

She felt Clark stepping "away" from her. Resolution in his voice, he said,

"Here's what we have to do. First, we have to get up. If I can get in the sunbeam, it will help me heal and we'll feel better. We can't count on anyone to save us here. My mother is in Metropolis for a few days. Did you tell anyone where you were going?"

"I left a note for Lois, but she's out all weekend."

"OK, we have to save ourselves then. We can't count on anyone looking for us. So getting up is step number one. Step number two is finding your body."

"My body?" Chloe stammered. _Oh my God, I wasn't connecting here! If I'm in Clark's body, what happened to mine? _Again she felt her heart race. "Maybe I'm dead. I mean, maybe my body is dead! Oh no, what if I'm dead?"

"Chloe, calm down!" Clark said, and she got the impression that he had his hands on her shoulders and was shaking her a little bit. "You can't be dead, you're talking to me!"

"Maybe I'm a ghost! Maybe I'm just haunting you!" she felt herself slipping into hysteria. Her stomach churned in fear.

"Stop it, Chloe. Stop it! You're upsetting my stomach too!" The sheer incongruity of the remark stopped the hysterical fit in its tracks. Suddenly Chloe began laughing loudly. The laughs tailed off into little whooping cries and then into silence.

She felt drained. "OK", she said. "OK, I'm going to gather myself. I'm going to remain calm. I can do this."

"I knew you could, Chloe", said Clark. The feeling of his presence backed away from her a little bit, as if he had been standing by her to support her but was now moving away. She felt a little bereft.

"OK, the first thing is to open your eyes – or my eyes, or our eyes, or whatever or whose-ever they are! Once the eyes are open, we can look for your body," Clark said. Chloe tried, but her lids remained down. Panic bubbled up again.

"We'll be ok", Clark said reassuringly. "Try again." This time Chloe was able to open her eyes. Again, she saw the dusty floor of the cave, and the sunbeam with the motes of dust floating in it.

"Here's something interesting – when you were trying to open my eyes, so was I. It didn't work", Clark said. "Now lifting up the right hand."

Chloe tried. How difficult was it to lift one's hand? You willed it, it happened. But this time it didn't.

Clark said, "Try again." This time the right hand came up, no problem.

"Chloe? I think we have a problem."

"What, Clark?"

"I was trying to move my hand at the same time you were. It didn't work. I think only one of us can run the body at one time."

"How am I doing it when it's your body?"

"I don't know. Maybe because you woke up first? Right now, it seems as if you have control. Can you try letting go? Then I'll try again."

"This is so weird….OK, Clark." Chloe concentrated. Nothing happened. "I tried again, but it didn't work", Clark said. "Can you try again?"

Chloe's eyes closed. She imagined herself in a dark room at a control console. She imagined herself backing away from the console. It was hard to do. It felt as if little strands were holding her in place. She had to stretch the strands to move backwards. As she moved backwards, the bright flashing lights on the console stopped flashing and dimmed down a bit.

"Clark, try now", she said. Suddenly she had the oddest feeling. Her eyes were opening and her hand was lifting, but she wasn't doing it. She felt like a puppet. She could feel her body moving but it was not of her own volition. Reflexively, she imagined herself moving back to the control console. The lights flashed again and became brighter. She realized that her hand had stopped moving.

"Chloe? I think now you're pushing at me." She heard Clark's voice in the dark room. Semi-reluctantly, she moved backwards again from the console, and her hand again began to lift, again without her own volition.

'Oh, boy. I can see this is going to be a long process." Chloe said. She heard Clark sigh in agreement.

Several hours later, after a lot of practice, Chloe and Clark had discovered several things.

Although only one of them could control the body at a time, the other could effectively stop whatever the first was doing. Strangely enough, this could be done either by trying to do what the first was doing, or by trying to do the opposite of what the first was doing.

No matter which of them was controlling the body, both of them could feel everything the body felt.

Autonomic functions seemed to work fine without either of them – the body kept breathing, no problem.

The only way to make things work was for one of them to figuratively "stand back" and let the other one do things.

The control could be switched effortlessly from one to the other in a heartbeat. This had taken the most time to learn and to practice. It went against all natural instincts. They still couldn't do it consistently. It was unnatural. If you were in a body, you wanted to run it. You expected to run it. You weren't used to being a passive observer in your own body. In the end, it had been Chloe's badminton experience that helped her here. She thought of it as either serving the birdie, or waiting for the serve.

They had spent some time just trying to get up. Their first attempt was a gangling, flailing tangle of limbs that ended with them falling flat on their face. At that point, Chloe got an inkling of what it was like to be Clark Kent. She cried in fear as her face smacked the floor. She knew that she would have _a broken nose, two black eyes, chipped teeth, a lot of pain! _ But as she lay there, she realized that all she felt was her face touching the cave floor. She rolled her eyes sideways and saw the splintered and shattered rock of the cave floor, in a Clark's-head-sized divot.

"Hey, this invulnerability thing is pretty darn handy right now", Chloe said semi-sarcastically. She could feel Clark gathering himself to make a comment, but then subsiding and just laughing in agreement.

They pressed on with their trials to win back control of the body, to learn how to share it. Triumph coursed through them both as they were able to make the body kneel, then slowly stand up. It swayed alarmingly, and both rushed to control its balance. Inevitably, they fell down again.

"Chloe? Let me handle it this time", Clark said. She metaphorically backed away from the control panel, fighting her impulse to remain. The body stood up smoothly. "OK, now I'm going to look for you."

"Clark?! Hello, I'm right **here**!"

"I mean I'm going to look for your body."

"Oh."

Chloe felt her head move around, scanning the cave. It was getting darker now; they had spent quite a few hours on their aimless flailing. She didn't see her body anywhere.

"Oh, Clark, where am I? What happened to me?"

"I remember the rockfall and trying desperately to push you to safety. I think I used my heat vision to try and vaporize a rock that was going to fall on you. I'm sure you're here somewhere."

"We're still too uncoordinated to walk around. Can you see in the dark?"

"Not specifically, but using the X-ray vision doesn't depend on visible light."

Chloe felt her eyes squinting. Then suddenly, _something_ happened, and her vision was a mishmash. She couldn't make head or tail of what she was seeing. Panic lanced through her.

"Clark! Clark! What's happening?"

"Couldn't you tell? I can see your body way over there in the corner. No wonder we couldn't see it before – it's in a dark area and there's rocks around it."

"Am I dead?"

"No, I can see your heart beating and you're breathing. The heartbeat is pretty slow, though."

"Do you see any injuries?"

"I don't see any fractures and things look ok – you're just unconscious. I mean, your body is unconscious. There are a lot of rocks on you, though."

Chloe gave a sigh of relief at these words. "Well, we've got to get more coordinated so we can rescue me!"

Clark said, "Chloe, I felt some panic from you while I was looking. What happened?"

"I don't know. It's like I couldn't see right. Everything was all mixed up. I was seeing stuff but it wasn't coming together, sort of", Chloe replied.

"I wonder…you know, when I first got my X-ray vision it was real alarming. I didn't know what to make of it, and it took me a few days to get used to it. I guess I learned to integrate it into my worldview. Maybe your brain isn't used to it."

"Clark, I'm using _your_ brain!"

"Well, maybe your soul, or whatever, isn't used to it."

"Do you think I'll be able to make sense of it when you're using the X-ray thingy?"

"All we can do is practice. But let's go back to practicing standing and walking first."

They continued their strange duet. Gradually, they were able to stand and maintain their balance. At first, Clark would stand, then hand over control to Chloe. Then they tried the opposite. The cave floor became more pocked with holes and rock splinters littered the area.

They felt a surge of triumph as they took their first step. The second step ended up with them, inevitably, on the cave floor again.

"Hey, I'm getting a little tired of falling on my face here," said Chloe. "I think part of it is that you're so much taller than I am. I keep on misjudging your stride – it's so much longer than mine. It's a good thing you're the man of steel because otherwise my face would be hamburger. I vote for a short break here."

"I need a little break too," Clark agreed. "I think I have a water bottle in my backpack; let's see if we can manage a drink."

Reaching for the backpack, which was providentially close by, they opened the zipper and pulled out a bottle of water. By now they were pretty good on controlling the arms and upper body. Chloe opened the zipper and Clark grabbed the bottle and untwisted the cap. He put the bottle to their mouth.

"Oh, that's good", Chloe sighed. She could feel Clark's agreement. She suddenly realized that the crowded, crushed feeling was mostly gone. Sitting comfortably on the cave floor, she suddenly realized that she wanted to just sit for a minute, and not have to deal with re-learning to walk all over again. She closed the eyes (Clark let her) and retreated mentally to the dark room of their shared consciousness.

She could feel Clark's presence still, but now it was not so foreign. It felt more comfortable, like a rough piece of wood that had been sanded down. Her mind chased that image and she laughed. She opened her eyes and looked at Clark. She gasped in shock – she could feel him but when she looked at where he was, there was a giant tree there, a tree with beautiful fall-colored leaves of red and yellow.

"Clark? I think I'm seeing things. Am I going crazy?"

"What?"

"I looked at you – you know, in our head – and you look like a _tree._"

"What kind of a tree?"

"I don't know! Something with a huge trunk and lots of thick branches and a ton of leaves! Hey, wait a minute – only _you _would ask 'what kind of tree'!

"Well, I'm kind of used to bizarre happenings."

"Maybe it's an expression of the way I think you are."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you're strong. And you're tall."

"Not that tall." 

"Hey, I'm on a roll here – don't stop me."

"OK, go on…"

"I feel like this is the kind of tree where you could climb up and be safe in the branches. You could build a treehouse in it. It would give you shade in the hot summer days. You could lean against the bark and it would be _solid._ You could depend on this tree."

Clark was momentarily silent. Chloe realized that she had taken him aback. Then she felt him gather himself to speak.

"You know, Chloe, when you said that, I looked at you in a different way, too."

"How did you see me?"

"You are a column of fire. There are dancing flames all around your edges, red, yellow, orange. Then the center coalesces into a straight pillar, with a white-hot center."

Chloe sat still for a moment, digesting this thought.

Clark continued, "It's what I think you're like." He momentarily hesitated, as if he were embarrassed. "You are the most caring person I know. You're straight and true. You're devoted to the truth. Maybe that's what I'm seeing in the core – the white-hot purpose of your soul. And you are curious about everything. It's like those dancing flames are your curiosity, your thoughts, a manifestation of your personality."

Chloe felt strangely flattered. She sat in silence for a moment. She looked down at herself. For a moment, she actually felt that she could see herself as Clark saw her, with tiny flames dancing from her skin, but not hurting her in the least. Then her natural sarcasm rose to the surface. "OK, enough of the soul-reading stuff."

Clark said, "Wait a minute. Let me tell you this. When I got close to your flames, it was like I could feel you. When we try to touch each other here, it hurts, doesn't it? But when I got near your "flames", it didn't."

"What are you saying, Clark?"

"Let's try something totally crazy here. I want you to think about something totally removed from where we are, something inconsequential. Then I want you to sort of "package up" that thought and toss it to me."

"OK, it's not like we have anything better to do right now."

Chloe thought back. She didn't want to think about her body and the passing of time. She didn't want to think anything about Clark – it would be too embarrassing if he knew the full depths of her feeling for him. Thinking about Lana was definitely out, if only because it would lead to Clark. She cast her mind back to her childhood. "I spent a lot of time reading books", she mused.

Suddenly she was back in the kid's section of the Smallville library. _That was before they had "Young Adult", _she thought. _I just read everything they had on the shelf, whether it was "too old" for me or not._ She remembered looking at the faded blue covers, long denuded of their dust jackets, and looking at the skirted silhouette of a young woman holding a magnifying glass. _Hey, I guess small-town libraries don't get rid of books very often. Some of these may have been here since the thirties. _She picked up one the small blue volumes. "The Quest of the Missing Map", it said. "A Nancy Drew Mystery Story." _I liked this one,_ she thought. She remembered more and made herself imagine writing it all (at superspeed!) on a piece of paper. She crumpled the paper and tossed it to Clark.

She looked at him. She was seeing him as Clark again, not as a big tree. Then her vision wavered, and she saw Clark dissolve into the ocean, a million shades of blue, calm and quiet now, but pregnant with the possibilities of storm, rough seas, whirlpools, tsunami. Her paper fell into the ocean and dissolved.

Clark sat still for a moment and then laughed. "Hey, I loved 'The Quest of the Missing Map'!" he said. Isn't that the one where Nancy and her friends all go off and find the buried treasure?"

"Yeah, they have to find two pieces of the treasure map that was ripped in half years ago and given to twins separated at a young age", Chloe responded automatically. "Wait a minute? You read Nancy Drew?"

"I've read every book in the Smallville Library," Clark said smugly. "I liked the Hardy Boys better, but Nancy Drew was pretty good too. I still liked her, though – I always wondered what a roadster was."

"Yeah, and I was always in awe of the fact that she could get pulled over by a cop and say, "My father is the famous attorney, Carson Drew", and then she'd skate off without a ticket. It never worked for me."

"And didn't she ever have to go to school? She was only sixteen."

Clark and Chloe looked at each other, then burst into laughter. Big whoops split the air, dying down into giggles.

Chloe said, "Don't forget Ned Nickerson!" They started laughing again. "Bess and George!" Clark choked out.

The laughter ended but they were still smiling at each other. "Clark, all kidding aside, reading Nancy Drew stories is one reason why I became a reporter. I wanted to solve mysteries just like her."

"Chloe, you are", Clark said in a serious tone. "I know you've found your calling."

"Well, enough of the Girl Detective sidebar. It's your turn."

"Chloe, I'm going to try something here." Chloe could see Clark turn inward, concentrating. She looked away, then looked back at him – he was the tree again. A leaf fell from the tree and blew towards her. She cupped it in her hands. It dissolved into her skin, leaving a faint tracery of red and yellow fire on her palms.

_She was climbing a rope next to Pete Ross. She looked at him and saw muscles, veins, nerves. She fell off the rope in surprise. She looked at the wall – she was seeing girls in the locker room! Naked girls! Sexual excitement coursed through her and she gave a big smile. Then there was a jump – suddenly she was in the barn loft, looking at a piggy bank, and trying to count the coins in it. Her brow furrowed and she made a mental adjustment that she couldn't describe, but the coins came in focus. Another jump, and she was looking at Lana, seeing Lana's skeleton; another jump and she was looking at a skeleton with weird green patches, knowing this was Tina Greer, the shapeshifter. Further jumps followed one after another faster than she could comprehend, looking through walls, looking down from a windmill and seeing Chloe (myself!) in a buried coffin; standing in the graveyard at the Chloe Sullivan tombstone and seeing an empty coffin; looking through walls, through people, seeing the different densities of metal, bone, muscle, fat, and air. _

"Wow! Is that what you see when you use your X-ray vision, Clark?"

"I didn't know if you would get it or not. I guess you did."

"That is so cool!"

"I have an idea here. I'm going to open our eyes and look again at your body using the X-ray vision. Let me know what you see."

Clark suited the action to the deed. She could feel his eyes focusing and suddenly knew the mental adjustment he was making. She looked – she could see! She was actually using the X-ray vision! It wasn't a cubist-pointillist-abstract art fantasy anymore. She looked harder and could see a skeleton laying near the side of the cave wall. She felt Clark adjusting the vision, pulling back – she saw the heart beating, the lungs expanding and contracting, the muscles, then the skin as he reverted to normal vision. She realized she was seeing her own body.

"Did it work?" Clark asked anxiously.

"Yes! I could see my body. God, do you see everything like that when you look at someone?"

"Well, I don't use the X-ray vision all that much – I have to focus to use it. I don't always "pull back" the vision so slowly that I can see every layer, so to speak. Sometimes I just look deep and go right for the skeleton."

"Your life is so weird."

"Yeah. Every once in awhile something makes me realize that."

Chloe shook her head and put her mind to considering what being able to use the X-ray vision meant. "OK, we're on a roll now!" Chloe exulted. "So it looks like we can pass knowledge to each other this way. That's kind of cool! "

Clark said, "Let's just practice the walking thing some more, then we can rescue your body."

Two hours later found them both sitting tiredly in the dark room of their consciousness. It was turning out to be a lot harder than they expected to coordinate motion, balance, volition, and the other person's _lack_ of volition.

"We're making progress", Clark said quietly.

"Yeah, if you count only falling down half the time instead of seventy-five percent of the time progress", Chloe retorted.

"Hey, I'm doing the best I can!" Clark snapped. Chloe looked at him again. This time she didn't see the tree or the ocean. She saw a wide blue sky, but dark storm clouds were rushing in to darken the sky, and threaten rain.

"Clark?" she said plaintively, shocked out of her anger. "I'm seeing you different again."

"What is it this time?" he said resignedly.

"This time you're the sky – it's like standing on the prairie and looking up at the vastness of the blue. But there's storm clouds coming – the sky is turning gray."

Clark sat silent for a moment. "Maybe that's because I'm tired and hungry and irritated." He gave a sigh. "If I am, I know you must be too."

"I am, Clark."

Clark said softly, "Hey, Chloe, let's just relax a minute. It's been a pretty rough day. We've been working hard. Maybe we're in the "more haste, less speed" mode right now."

"Really, I just want to lie down. I'm so tired!"

"We did put sandwiches in the backpack this morning." Chloe saw Clark smile as he said that. "You do the honors."

Chloe felt Clark "standing back" and she had control of the body. She stood up, wobbily, and walked to the backpack. She opened it and pulled out a plastic freezer bag containing four sandwiches. She took one out and bit into it.

"Oh God, this is so good right now." The rich smoothness of the peanut butter fit so well into the sweetness of the grape jelly. She chewed and swallowed. It was the best thing she had ever tasted.

"Let me take it from here – it's good practice", Clark said. Chloe relinquished control of the body (a move which was becoming more and more practiced, more and more easy to do) and let Clark move in. Chloe found herself contemplating the weirdness of feeling her own (_well, actually Clark's_, she thought) limbs moving without her willing it. She was a puppet and someone else was pulling the strings. She felt her hands pick up the water bottle, unscrew the cap, and lift the bottle to her lips. The cool water felt great as she swallowed. Her hands twisted the cap back on the bottle. She went to place it back in the backpack – and found herself falling over once again, smashing the sandwiches.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Chloe cried hysterically. Suddenly all the weird events of the day seemed to pile on her. She just couldn't take it any more. "I know I have to let go and let you run the body but I just can't help myself! It's like it's automatic!" She burst into tears.

Clark let the body go and it sprawled on the cave floor. Once again, they were alone together in the dark cave of their consciousness. Chloe found herself giving little whooping sobs as tears ran down her face. Clark moved towards her and shuffled uncertainly. Chloe realized that in the outside world, he would be hugging her and comforting her, but in here he couldn't touch her without the shock of their souls colliding. He settled for giving her another "leaf". As before, this one sank into her skin with a slight afterglow of complex fire.

There were no words in this gift; it was just a feeling of love and support. It was like being five years old and holding her favorite teddy bear as she went to sleep. It was putting a steel beam in a building under construction, a straight strong beam. It was leaning up against a strong tree. It was being in a warm safe home while lightning crashed and rain poured down outside.

Chloe felt her sobs diminishing and she felt calmer. "Thanks, Clark", she said softly.

"I think we need to sleep," he said. "I'm pretty tired too, and I don't think we're going to make a lot more progress at this time. I know you don't want to wait, but right now we can't get to your body and we might injure it if we try to pick it up."

Chloe realized dully that he was right. The urgency to do _something! anything! _had diminished in the face of the grueling struggle to control the body. She was so tired. Sleep sounded so good.

"OK, Clark," she said. "Can you make us lie down?"

"I think so."

Chloe deliberately pulled back as Clark took off the blue jacket they were wearing. She tried not to influence the body, but couldn't help herself. Once again, they fell to the floor.

"Well, that's one way," Clark said. Chloe pulled back again and watched as Clark wadded up the jacket and put it under their head. He closed the body's eyes.

Once again Chloe found herself in the dark room, looking at Clark. He looked as tired as she felt. "Kind of a bizarre day, isn't it, Kent?" she cracked.

"Definitely one for the personal Wall of Weird", he agreed. They stared at each other in silence for a moment.

"I'm really tired but I can't sleep", Chloe said. "It's like I just drank too much coffee."

"I didn't know you were capable of drinking too much coffee!" Clark smiled.

"Well, I do have a pretty high caffeine tolerance, but when I drink two pots of espresso, even I can get pretty wired up."

They sat in silence together for a moment. Chloe looked at Clark. Her perceptions shifted. The tree looked a little wilted now, like it needed some water, but it was still standing strong and tall. He saw her staring at him.

"What?" he said.

"Hey, what was your favorite 19th century author?" Chloe said not wanting to talk about their situation.

"Mark Twain." Clark said, tacitly going along with the conspiracy of silence regarding their predicament. "I loved 'Life on the Mississippi'. And his essays were great. He had some great lines, too. Let's see: 'Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.' He smiled.

"Yeah, Mark Twain is my favorite author too. I liked what he said about writing: 'The difference between the right word and the word that is almost right is the difference between the lightning and the lightning bug.' Words to live by, for a journalist." They sat quietly for a moment, then Chloe continued, "What was the scariest book you ever read?"

"Personally, it was one of those Stephen King horror novels. I read it late at night, I was alone, the stairs were creaking, and it was dark…"

"Yeah, some of his stuff is pretty darn scary."

"Chloe, what about you? What was your scariest book?" Clark continued to go along with her on the avoidance. Chloe felt grateful at the conversational small-talk.

"'Fahrenheit 451', by Ray Bradbury."

"Why?"

"Because the thought of anyone burning books just scares the hell out of me. How can they do that?"

Clark nodded. "You know, a book that scared the hell out of me was '1984' by George Orwell. That society was so grim. Big Brother was always watching you. They tried to control your thinking."

Chloe agreed. "A truly frightening book."

Clark said softly, "And I always worried that if my abilities were ever exposed, I would end up like Winston Smith."

Chloe looked at him in realization. He nodded.

"I guess that's why I've always been so secretive and so paranoid about anyone finding out," Clark said. "One of the better days of my life was when you told me you knew."

Chloe smiled with the memory of that day.

"Um, I know this is kind of a personal question, but were you freaked out when you saw me use my abilities? I mean, the first time?"

Chloe pondered her answer for a moment. "A little", she said in a quiet voice. It was hard for her to talk about her feelings of that time. "Let's try that information-passing thing again."

Again, she pictured herself packing up her thoughts and feelings of that day into a piece of paper. Clark interrupted her reverie.

"You know, when you do that, I see you as a column of fire again, and a big lick of flame is extending towards me."

Chloe didn't want to break her concentration by speaking; she made herself finish her package.

_She was working late at the Torch, trying to get some last-minute articles written before deadline. She flinched as a voice suddenly broke the silence. _

_"'Can Any Cell Hold Her?' Probably not."_

_A stab of fear went through Chloe as she recognized the voice of Alicia Baker, who was reading a Smallville Ledger headline on the Wall of Weird. Involuntarily, she stood up and backed away from Alicia. She put on a brave front._

_"Alicia, what are you doing here?" What are you doing here, she thought. You meteor freak, who almost killed Lana and Clark! If you want to hurt me, there's no way I can stop you. Don't show your fear, Chloe, don't show your fear. _

_Alicia toyed with her. "Chloe Sullivan. Ace reporter." Bitterness tinged her voice. "You write all these articles about the people you call meteor freaks and you don't even realize someone close to you is one of them." _

_What is she talking about? Chloe wondered._

_"Why are you ignoring what's right in front of your face, Chloe?" Alicia continued. "Don't you want to know the truth about Clark Kent?" _

_Chloe, stunned, sat silent for a moment. What does she mean by that? Could Clark be a … meteor freak? She rallied._

_"Everyone knows you're crazy. Why should I believe you?"_

_"You don't have to", Alicia replied. There was a cool assurance in her manner that gave Chloe the creeps. "I'm going to prove it. And then you can write the story of a lifetime."_

_Chloe flinched away but could not escape Alicia's grasp on her arm. Then there was an indescribable feeling, and she was sitting in the front seat of a car. Where was the Torch office? She gasped in shock as she realized that Alicia must have teleported them. _

_Her voice wavered as she said to Alicia, "Where are we? What are you doing?"_

_Alicia dialed her cell phone as she spoke. "Giving you your next headline.. And making things better for Clark." She started the car as the phone connected. _

_"Clark, I'm on the old Molsen Road and there's something really wrong with the car, it won't stop!" Alicia sounded panicked, but Chloe realized that of the two of them, she herself was closer to hysteria. She could hear Clark's voice over the phone. "Hang on!" he said. _

_Alicia continued her act. "Just hurry!"_

_As the car accelerated to a dangerous speed on the wet, slippery pavement, Alicia looked at her. "Once you see this, you'll understand, and then Clark can be who he really is. And you can use that poison pen of yours to enlighten Smallville for a change."_

_Chloe sat frozen in shock as the car continued to accelerate, going faster and faster. She looked ahead in fear as she saw orange traffic cones and construction barricades coming up. They would never be able to stop in time. Inanely, she thought, "And I'm not wearing my seatbelt." _

_Suddenly she saw Clark standing in the middle of the road, smack-dab in their path. "No!" she thought. "You'll get hurt!" She remembered once seeing a dog that had been smashed by a car – the broken bones protruding through the torn skin, the blood on the pavement, the stillness of death. "No!" _

_She felt Alicia grab her arm, and again there was that indescribable feeling which she now knew was teleportation. She found herself crouching next to Alicia behind some construction barricades, as the rain pattered listlessly around them. _

_She saw the car speeding towards Clark. "Clark, what are you **doing**?" she said, and started to stand up. _

_Alicia pulled her back down. "Don't worry, Chloe", she said._

_Suddenly the car hit a construction barricade. Bright lights flickered off its surface as it became airborne, headed directly for Clark. Chloe looked on in horror, expecting to see him crushed. Why wasn't he trying to get out of the way?_

_Ohmigod ohmigod ohmigod. Clark caught the car. Clark caught the car. Clark **caught** the car. How did he do that? _

_Chloe's mind gibbered in fear as Clark slowly lowered the car to the ground. She saw him look into the empty front seat. Later, she realized that he must have figured out that Alicia could teleport out of danger, so why did Alicia really need him? _

_Clark turned to look around. Don't look at me, thought Chloe. I'm not here. I'm hiding. Don't hurt me. Don't see me. _

_He seemed not to see her. Chloe gave an interior sigh of relief. He continued to look around for a moment. Then he vanished. She thought that she saw him start running but he was gone, a faint reflection of red and blue fading from the wet pavement. _

_Chloe's heart was beating uncontrollably. Her breath came in short gasps. Ohmigod. Ohmigod. **Ohmigod. **_

_Later, she found herself seated at the Talon, holding a cup of coffee. She had no idea how she had gotten there. Did Alicia teleport them back? Did they drive back? She had no memory of it. She stared into space, reliving the frightening thing she had seen. _

_Someone addressed her. "Chloe, have you seen Clark?"_

_"What?" she snapped. "Have I seen Clark do **what**?" Belatedly she realized Lois was talking to her. "Yeah, I've seen him." I've seen him do things no human could do, she realized, as her stomach did flipflops. I saw him catch a speeding car like it was a beachball. What else has he done?_

_"Where?" Lois's voice interrupted her train of thought. _

_"Why?" Chloe asked, her voice suspicious. Had he killed someone? Did he hurt someone? All the other meteor freaks she knew of had turned bad. What did Clark do? "Did something happen?" _

_Lois said impatiently, "I need to find Clark."_

_Chloe was desperate to get Lois away so that she could continue her ruminations. "He's probably zipping around looking for Alicia". Yeah, that's right, she thought, he's really probably vanishing and going to do meteor freak stuff. Trying to retain some semblance of coherence, she said, "Uh, he's probably out at Alicia's house." _

_Lois left. Chloe remained at the table, her untouched coffee slowly cooling in front of her. She sat there for two hours. _

_The next morning, she sat in the Torch office, looking at the Wall of Weird. I did miss the obvious, she thought. All those quick exits and lame excuses. How could I not see what was right in front of me? Some ace reporter I am, she thought bitterly. My best friend is a meteor freak. She was able to say the words calmly to herself now. She hadn't slept all night, thinking about it. How can I face him again? _

_Lois found her staring at the Wall. "Looking for things we should have seen before?" Lois said. _

_Little do you know, thought Chloe, bitterly. She said, "I think maybe I've seen too much already. I've spent the last four years ferreting out meteor freaks, trying to expose them. I never should have started this wall." She aimlessly packed some papers and books into a box, more to avoid Lois's eyes than for any other reason. _

_"Chloe, you're a reporter", Lois said, exasperatedly. "You investigate and expose, that's who you are." _

_"Well, I guess sometimes it sucks being me." Chloe thought. Clark was her best friend. Her best friend. Her best friend was a meteor freak. _

_Grasping at straws, she said, "Lois, if you found out something, something that somebody didn't want you to know about them, would you tell them?" She waited for Lois to reply._

_"That depends. Is the person someone you care about?" Lois said._

_Chloe thought. Yes, he is, she thought. All the time we've been together. All the times he's been there for me. Belatedly, she realized that Clark's meteor powers could explain a lot of the crazy things that had happened to her. When Deputy Watts had buried her alive near Chandler's Windmill, Clark had been the one to rescue her. How had he found her? He didn't have a shovel – how had he dug her up? He was there without a car, too – how did he get there? She found herself asking now –she had been too worked up to think of it at the time, and hadn't wanted to relive those days. _

_She remembered waking up in Clark's barn after getting hit on the head with a horseshoe, not from a horse kick, but from Justin Barnes, the telekinetic who, she had discovered, used his powers to murder. She was a little fuzzy on the details, but now realized that Clark had been there again for her. _

_And the time that Sean Kelvin had trapped her in the pool in a sheet of ice and wanted to steal her body heat and freeze her – Clark had come and punched through the ice and saved her. "I never thought to wonder how he was able to do that – I was so relieved to see him", she thought. _

_She remembered, too, waking up on the road with her shirt unbuttoned and Clark holding a syringe with a nasty-looking, incredibly long needle. Pain in her chest told her that she had been injected. Later, he explained that she had been contaminated by the Luthorcorp truth drug. It was great, it made everyone tell her the truth, but she had destroyed their teacher Mrs Taylor's life by exposing her as a federal fugitive. Clark told her that the Levitas would have killed her had he not given her the antidote. Clark saved me that time, she realized. _

_She looked at Lois. "Yes. The person is someone I care about."_

_Lois said, "And does keeping this secret hurt anyone?"_

_Chloe thought again. No, she realized, no, it doesn't. I have never seen Clark hurt anyone except people who were trying to hurt us. When Eric Summers had those super powers, Clark was the only person who was brave enough to confront him. And Clark got thrown into a truck and broke his ribs. Clark has always helped us. Now I realize what he was trying to keep a secret. I know why. Do I have to expose him? Look at how everyone treated Alicia. Nobody trusted her. Everyone knew she was a meteor freak. Nobody would talk to her. The police ran her in for questioning at the slightest strange event. She was innocent this time, but it didn't matter. She had the big scarlet "M" on her chest – Meteor Freak. Do I want to do that to Clark? Do I want to mess up his life? Can I return evil for good? _

_"No." she said. _

_"Then my answer is no", Lois said. "If I really cared about that person, I wouldn't tell them that I knew. But I would go out of my way to be supportive of them, so that hopefully one day, they would be comfortable enough to tell me themselves." _

_Later, after Lois had left for Metropolis, Chloe sat staring once again at the Wall of Weird. This time she felt calm. She had made a decision. Clark was a meteor freak and it didn't matter. She could trust him not to use his powers for evil (what a pretentious saying, she thought). He was her best friend. He had proven his friendship a hundred times over the years. Now she had some inkling of what he had done, that he never talked about, that he never took credit for. Scenes coursed through her mind, memories of her and Lana and Lex and Pete and other people, where weird things had happened, miraculous escapes from injury, jaw-droppingly incredible close brushes with death that everyone escaped unharmed from. It must have been him all along, she thought. _

_My best friend is a super-powered meteor freak. **It doesn't matter**, she thought. _

_She walked to the Wall of Weird. She unpinned the posted-up front page of the Smallville Ledger. The headline read, "Miracle Pass Wins State Championship". A photo of Clark throwing a football was under the headline. _

_"Clark, why didn't you just tell me?" she said. But inside, she knew. Ashamedly, she realized why. If I had meteor powers, I wouldn't have told, she thought. All Clark has ever seen you do is expose, report, bring things out to the light of day. You've hurt people with the truth sometimes. Sometimes you didn't need to print everything, but you did anyway. _

_The truth hurt. _

_Later, she sought Clark. His parents told her that he was at Alicia's grave. The day was gray and rainy as she walked in the cemetery, seeing Clark's blue jacket as he knelt before Alicia's headstone. She paused to bolster her courage. _

_"Hey, Clark…" she said softly. "I just wanted to say that I'm so sorry for everything." She was glad that he kept his eyes on the headstone and didn't look at her. It made it a little bit easier. He said nothing._

_"It must have been so hard, being so different….having everyone judge you before they even know you. Knowing there's people who might never accept you." Clark continued to avoid looking at her, but he lifted his head a bit. _

_Chloe hesitated, then went on. "I just…I want you to know that I'm here for you…if you ever need to talk." _

_Clark's eyes darted towards her, then back to the gravestone. "Thanks, Chloe. I appreciate that", he said in a low voice. _

_Chloe looked at him. Her best friend. A meteor freak. It didn't matter. It didn't matter. She left him there at the grave, in the gray, foggy, rainy day, and walked away. _

She tossed the paper to Clark. It sank into his hand.

She watched his face go blank as he relived her memory. He kept his head down for awhile, then slowly looked up. He had the saddest expression that she had ever seen.

"You were really that scared of me?" he said wearily.

"At first", Chloe admitted. "I guess it's only human to be afraid of the unknown." She saw Clark grimace a little at the word "human." "But then I realized you would never hurt anyone."

Clark frowned. "I could hurt someone." He said it quietly. "I have the capability. You know what I'm afraid of, Chloe?"

"What?"

"Hurting someone just because I'm careless. You're so fragile. _Humans _are so fragile. I think if you're going to hurt someone, it should be because you decide it. It shouldn't be that you hurt them just by shaking their hand too hard, or misjudging a pat on the back."

"Clark, you've been able to control your abilities so far."

"But I couldn't always. When I was a kid, I broke my father's arm through carelessness."

"How?" Chloe asked, momentarily distracted.

"Threw a baseball too hard during a game of catch," Clark said. "And what if I'm not myself? So many weird things have happened. Do you remember the football game where I tripped? It was one of the worst feelings of my life, to see that Topeka West player lying there on the ground. All I could think was, 'What if I paralyzed him for life?' It was such a relief when he only had a broken collarbone. But even that was bad, because it was my fault."

"That was Mikail Mxyztplk's jinx power!" protested Chloe.

"But what if something like that happens again? Or I go on red kryptonite? Or I get possessed?" Clark was almost pleading with her.

Chloe remained silent for a moment. "Well, Clark, there's no denying that a lot of weird stuff has gone down here in Smallville. But you've always retained some decency at your core. You've always done the right thing in the end."

"Chloe, I just don't know that I always will. That's what I'm afraid of. I have these abilities and --"

"Clark, the bottom line is that you have them. And you're stuck with them. Or am I wrong on that? You tried going human before and it blew up in your face. You have to deal with it. I know you have doubts, but I trust you to handle things."

"I don't know that I've made a lot of good choices lately."

"Clark, we all make mistakes. My Dad used to say, "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from poor judgment." Sardonically, Chloe said, "Right now, let's just say that you're gaining experience."

Clark smiled a little. "Well, I guess that's one way to look at it."

"You know, after I got over my freak-out about your powers, and got some time to think about it, you know the first thing I thought?"

"No, what?"

"It's so cool! It's like waking up on Christmas morning and there's a pile of presents under the tree for you. There's something fantastic in the world and it's you. Life isn't all gray; there's a spark of magic in it."

"You're only saying that because it's not you that has to deal with the powers."

Chloe looked at him seriously. "I know this worries you, Clark. But I firmly believe that life only asks of you what you can give. I think you can give a lot."

Clark looked away from her for a bit. Then he sat straighter, and looked back at her. "I'll try." They stared at each other in silence for a bit.

The tension broken, Chloe joked a little. "You're not usually this angst-y. What's up?"

"Being in this situation with you – we really are stuck here, I can't use my powers, your body may be hurt and it may have been due to something that I did – I'm really worried."

Chloe swallowed. "Yeah, well, I'm not really all that excited about our situation either. I'm trying to remain calm. I guess it's what they say in the serenity prayer, 'Give me the strength to change the things I can change, and the serenity to accept the things I can't change.' Right now we're in a situation and we've got to take it slow – I can't change that. I have to tell myself to just take it a step at a time."

Clark moved a little closer to her. In their dark room, she could feel his presence, his "Clark-ness", more fully. "Well, if I had to be stuck in a situation with anyone, I'm glad it's you."

"Thanks, Clark", she said softly.

"You're a good friend, Chloe." Clark murmured. "One of my best days was when you found out – it meant no more lies. Do you want to know how I felt when you told me that you knew?"

"I can guess. Shocked? Flustered?"

"Let me show you." He cupped his hands; then she saw the tree again, and a leaf fluttered past her. She caught it in the air and lived his memory.

_She was Clark Kent. He saw Chloe shivering, curled in the fetal position at the Fortress of Solitude. It didn't take a genius to know that Chloe was in trouble. She looked at him and he smiled reassuringly at her. Then shock coursed through him as she said, "I think it's time you switch into Super-Clark mode now."_

_Stunned, he could only repeat, "Super-Clark?" _

_Chloe's words were punctuated by shivering gasps. "I know you can run faster than a speeding bullet, Clark." It felt like a punch to the gut. "Take me along for the ride." _

_He picked her up and looked at her. What did she know? His breath came in short gasps as he considered what she had said. Her shivering in his arms focused him to the task at hand. He had to save her. "Go, Clark!" she said, and he ran. _

_Later, after she had been taken to the hospital and warmed and treated for frostnip (the doctors said that she had avoided frostbite, fortunately), he found himself in her room, wondering how to bring up the topic. _

_"What did you tell them?" she said. _

_"I said that we were hiking, and a bear got into our tent and we had to run away from it. That's why we don't have any gear with us." _

_"Good story, Clark," she said. "But then, you have a lot of good stories, don't you?"_

_He looked at her, not knowing how to respond. He knew that they would have to talk about it, and he was afraid. _

_"I wonder who's more freaked out right now – me, knowing I'm in a hospital where they get their medicines via dogsled", she said, grinning, "or you, finally finding out I know your secret."_

_It was out. He could talk about it. He hoped it would be easier than the time he had told Pete. He could still remember Pete's incredulity, followed by anger and then fear. He never told his parents about how wounding it was to have Pete look at him like a **thing**, not a person. He didn't think he could bear it if Chloe did that. _

_He lifted his gaze from the floor and looked at her. "How long have you known?" he asked Chloe, trying to gauge what she might have seen. She was always too smart, too observant. She would make a good investigative reporter. _

_"I guess I've always had my suspicions – the quick exits, the miraculous recoveries, the lame excuses", she said with a little smile. "But, I think, when I saw you catch…a **car**…like it was a beachball…that kinda confirmed everything."_

_That was six months ago, he thought. It was hard to talk. He looked away again, moved to the window, keeping his back to Chloe, looking out at the gray sky. "Why didn't you say anything?" _

_She spoke softly. "I figured that it you wanted to tell me that you were part of the super-powered persuasion, you would, when you were ready. On your terms, not on mine." _

_That explains all those comments she'd been making, he thought. He'd suspected something was up, was wondering if she knew something. And weren't there a few times when he was wondering how to explain something odd, and she jumped on it with some lame reason that deflected attention from him? He realized that she had been covering for him. _

_"You're a good friend, Chloe", he said, nodding as he remembered more episodes where she had backed him up. _

_"Obviously, not good enough", she said, with a trace of bitterness. _

_"There were so many times I wanted to tell you", he said truthfully. But I was afraid, he said to himself. I told myself that it was that I didn't want to put you in danger, but really it was because I was afraid of what you might say or that you might not like me anymore. _

_"Look, I don't blame you", she said, being a friend all the way. "Loose lips sink ships, and God knows I've sunk my share of flotillas." There was a moment of silence. Then she asked softly, "What about Lana? Does she know?"_

_He turned slowly to Chloe, thinking of the last five years of his on-again, off-again romance with Lana. "No", he said softly. If he was afraid to tell Chloe, he was even more afraid to tell Lana. "No", he said again, with five years of pain, recriminations, self-doubt and guilt behind it. _

_Chloe obviously considered his answer for a moment. "Well, I want you to know that I will never be the iceberg to your Titanic, and your secret will never, ever leave my lips. No matter what."_

_Somehow he hadn't worried about that. He knew down deep that Chloe would never betray him. But it was good to hear it out loud._

_He smiled a little bit. "I appreciate that." _

_Chloe smiled back at him. He could tell that she wasn't satisfied yet, though. Her reporter instincts were in full alert mode, and her "weirdar" was pinging at the highest setting. "There's still a few blind spots, though", she said. "Like, how did we get beamed from the Kawatche caves to the North Pole?" Clark moved towards her bed. "And, uh, what was really going on in that forty-story igloo?" He sat down in the chair next to the bed. _

_He sighed. It was time to tell the whole story. "Well, Chloe, there's a lot of things about me that even I don't understand." True, and after being in the Fortress of Solitude for just a few minutes, he was beginning to understand just how little he actually did know. _

_He glanced at her. She obviously wasn't going to say anything, but he could tell she wanted to. She looked away, disappointment on her face. He's not going to tell me, she was thinking, and he could tell that was what she was thinking._

_He took the plunge. Taking a deep breath, he said, "The meteor rocks didn't make me who I am." He looked away from her, then gathered his courage and looked in her eyes again. _

_"So, you're saying that you were born this way?" She was quick. She raised her eyebrows and looked directly at him, willing him to go on. _

_He swallowed. He sat up straighter in the chair, moving closer to her. He sighed and licked his lips. His heart was racing, his stomach churning. "I wasn't born anywhere near Smallville." _

_He looked directly at her. She gave a little "go-on" gesture. _

_Time to do it. "In fact, I wasn't born anywhere near this galaxy." He said it flatly. There it was, out between them, like a big pile of cow manure on the dining room floor – something definitely unexpected that would stop dinner and raise a few eyebrows, he thought. _

_Incomprehension flashed across her face; then a wide smile as she assumed he was kidding. But soon, there was a look of fear as she realized that he was serious and she had to get her mind around this new concept. _

_Her voice was unsteady as she said, "So that would then make you…."_

_An alien, he mentally completed the sentence. Gently, he said, "Yes."_

_Chloe's face showed alarm and confusion. Her mouth was hanging open in surprise. "But…but you look…so…." _

_"Human?" he said sardonically. He knew he looked human, but had been afraid all his teen years that getting new powers would also change his appearance. Fortunately, so far, it had not. _

_He felt old and tired. This coming-out-of-the-closet stuff wore on you. He didn't want Chloe to be frightened of him, and it looked like she was going to be. _

_"I'm still the same person", he said quietly. Hoping against hope that she would still see him as her friend, as a regular guy. He looked her directly in the eyes as he said it, challenging her. What is she thinking? He asked himself. He wanted to take her hand, but was deathly afraid that she would pull away from him. _

_She shook her head. I really must have stumped her, Clark thought, because she's speechless for once. _

_"Clark, I… I…" she sighed, unable to form a sentence. He waited in dreadful anticipation for her to say something like "You're not human!" or "What are you, anyway?" _

_"I think you're so amazing!" she smiled at him._

_This was not what he had expected at all. Fear, confusion, yes; not compliments. Disconcerted, he looked down. _

_"You save people's lives and take zero credit for it. To me, you're more than just a hero. You're a super-hero." _

_Well, that was flattering, if untrue. Superheroes didn't cause meteor showers and property damage and put people's lives in danger. He shook his head reflexively. _

_"No, I'm serious, Clark." There was a short pause. "If more **humans** were like you, the world would be a better place." She gave him a tiny smile. _

_That's how she's reacting? I'm not freaking her out too bad? She thinks I'm not so bad! Involuntarily, he gave a return smile. They looked at each other. _

_The moment could not be sustained. He sat back in the chair, then got up to turn on the TV. They needed to distance themselves from the uncomfortable truth for awhile. _

_The TV news horrified him. He heard the announcer say something about "meteor shower" and "Smallville, Kansas", but the sight of his house – his house! -- and their packed truck still sitting in the driveway, sent a shiver of fear through him. _

_"They didn't get out! My parents didn't get out!" he said, worry coiling through his gut. _

_"Smallville needs you more than I do, Clark. Go." Trust Chloe to know what to do. He dithered for a moment, not wanting to leave her alone. _

_"Go!" she repeated. _

_I'm going, he decided. He nodded his head, turned towards the doorway, intending to go out in the hallway and then slip into super-speed. Then he realized that he didn't have to pretend, didn't have to hide, in front of Chloe anymore. He turned to face her, then turned to the door and sped away, wondering what she would think of his "vanishing act". _

_Even during his run, despite his worry about his parents (and even worrying a little bit about Lois), he had a little warm feeling in him. Chloe knows, he thought, and it's ok. It's ok. _

Chloe lifted her head. She was back to herself. "God, I never knew…" she started.

"Knew what?" Clark said.

"That it would be so scary to face me", she said.

Clark gave a rueful laugh. "It's always scary to face you", he joked. "All kidding aside, though, it's really hard for me to tell someone. I'm glad that you found out earlier and you'd gotten over the freak-out stage by then."

"Well, the whole alien thing was the big surprise", she said. "I thought you were just a garden-variety meteor freak."

"Hey, I'm not a garden-variety anything", he said jokingly. They were quiet for a moment.

"Clark?"

"Yes?"

"I'm glad we're friends."

"Me, too." Pause. "Let's get some sleep."

Chloe snuggled up on the floor of the dark room. She could feel Clark's presence close by her. She had no blankets, hadn't brushed her teeth, or washed her face, or done any of her nighttime ritual. _I guess this isn't really happening in the physical world, so it doesn't count_, she thought. She drifted away. She thought that she felt the body move, but couldn't tell for sure before she slipped into blackness.

She woke. Clark was still next to her in their dark room of consciousness, but he was asleep. She opened the body's eyes. They were where they had lain down last night. Dust motes floated in the sunbeam coming through the hole in the ceiling. She looked at the corner where her body was lying. That part of the cave was still in darkness. She did the mental trick that commanded the X-ray vision, and looked at her body. It was still breathing and the heart was beating, although both were very slow.

"We've got to take care of this soon", she said to herself. She remembered back to when Jonathan Kent had been in a coma. She remembered Martha saying that, if the person couldn't move himself, it was so important to keep changing the body position to avoid bedsores, pneumonia, other problems. _My body has been in the same position for over sixteen hours – that can't be good. _

She tried getting up. The body's movement woke up Clark, there was a moment of confusion, and they fell down again.

"Aargh! I almost had it there!" she said.

"And a very good morning to you, too, Miss Sullivan", Clark said sweetly.

"I hate smartasses early in the morning! And I especially hate them when I haven't had my coffee yet!"

"Oh no, I'm trembling in my boots", Clark mocked her. "Aren't we a just a wee bit cranky this morning?"

Chloe, about to make a quick retort, shoved it down inside her, and spoke calmly. "Actually, Clark, all kidding aside, we've got to do something about our situation soon."

"I know, Chloe", he replied seriously. "I think we've both had time to sleep and I'm hoping that that's allowed us to integrate all the stuff we did yesterday."

"That makes sense", she said. "Let's try it."

Their hopes were fulfilled as they concentrated, and slowly stood up. They took a wobbly step, and retained their balance.

"This is great, Clark! I think we've got it!" Chloe was excited.

"Actually, we have one other problem."

"What?"

"We have to take a piss."

Chloe was dumbfounded, then embarrassed. Then she realized that the body was giving urgent signals that nature was calling. Yes, indeed, they did have to go, and crossing her legs wasn't going to solve the problem.

"OK, I'm out of this one", she said. "It's your body, you handle it." She felt Clark smiling. "So to speak."

"Actually, I peed last night after you were asleep, Chloe."

"If you had control of the body, why didn't you rescue my body and speed back to the farm?"

"Because I fell asleep right after. I think you sleeping made me sleep too."

Chloe gave a snort of exasperation.

"Let's get on track here. Piss first, then get your body, then go home and see what we can do." Clark said. His expression indicated that he was a little embarrassed too, but was going to deal with necessities.

"OK, it's all yours." Chloe mentally backed off from control. They were doing a lot better this morning than they had done yesterday. Clark was able to remain standing and didn't fall down while working with the buttons and zippers. He was giving a sigh of relief and zipping up, when Chloe said mischievously, "Well, I always wanted to have my hands on Clark Kent's private parts, but I meant from the **outside.**"

"Chloe!" Clark was blushing. He almost got caught in the zipper.

She took pity on him. "Just kidding", she lied. "How do you guys stand all that down there anyway? Doesn't it chafe?"

"Didn't you notice this yesterday?" Clark snapped at her. She could tell that he was way too much of a gentleman to talk about handling of private parts. His face colored with embarrassment.

"Well, no, actually", she said, taunting him further.

"Let's move on from here, shall we?" Clark said tightly.

Getting back to business, Chloe observed, "Hey, we're doing a lot better now managing the body, aren't we? I think you're right that sleeping on it helped us absorb the knowledge."

"Whatever, as long as it works", Clark replied. "Let's go."

They stood carefully and took a few steps. Chloe felt a surge of triumph go through her as they continued to walk without falling. She could feel echoes of the same feeling from Clark. They headed towards Chloe's body near the edge of the cave.

As Chloe neared her body, she began to feel a little nauseous. The feeling became stronger the closer they came to the body.

"Stop!" Clark said urgently.

"What is it?" Chloe asked, irritated.

"There's kryptonite near", he said. "You haven't felt it before, but I know."

"What?"

"When I get near kryptonite, I start to feel nauseated and weak. If we get closer, we'll get weaker and weaker. We can't get near. Nobody is here to help us if we get in trouble, and we have to rescue you."

Chloe said some bad words to herself. "So, my body is right there, but we can't get near it?"

"Right. Much as I hate to say so."

"So what are we going to do? You know, Clark, this is one time when your Kryptonian ancestry, superpowers or no, is a pain in the shorts."

"OK, let's take this one step at a time", he said, ignoring her snide comment. "Let's scout out the situation first."

They looked at Chloe's body. Now they were closer and could see her body lying on its side on the floor of the cave, covered with dust and various-sized rocks. Chloe could see bruising on her head and legs. One arm had come out of the daypack straps. A soft-ball sized chunk of rock on her rib cage interfered with their visualization of her torso.

"I think the problem is the big chunk on your chest", Clark said to her.

"What?"

"Can you see it glowing a little bit?"

Chloe looked harder – indeed, the large rock was glowing green just a bit.

"I think that's the kryptonite piece. If we can knock it off your chest, then we can get near. I have a plan."

Five minutes later found them with a pile of small rocks.

"So, you're going to throw rocks at the rock on my chest?" Chloe demanded. "Do you need all the rocks in the pile?"

"That's the plan", Clark said. "I'm betting I'll only need one rock, but, you know, 'Be Prepared' and all that." He seemed almost jaunty. "We'll knock it at least eight feet away, then move in." He sounded confident to Chloe, but from her vantage point inside his head, she could feel an underlayer of concern. _I'm picking up on subvocal emotions now_, she realized in a combination of amazement and mild fear. _We are definitely getting too close. I've got to get back in my own head and out of his. _

"OK, but you do the throwing", she told him, carefully not saying anything about the underlying tension she felt. "You're the one with the 'golden arm', mister quarterback."

He chuckled, "Now you know why." Clark circled around, maintaining his distance from the deadly kryptonite, looking for the right angle. "Here we go."

Chloe withdrew mentally from the body, leaving Clark in complete control. He wound up, then threw a golf-ball sized rock at her body. With relief, she saw that it had struck the chunk on her torso and knocked it a considerable distance from her body.

"I am definitely taking you to the carnival the next time I need to win a stuffed animal at the milk-can toss", she said. She sensed an underlying feeling of relief, a feeling that he hadn't been quite as confident as he had portrayed himself to her.

"No problem", Clark said. "Let's go and get your body."

They hurried over to her body, Chloe anxiously awaiting evaluation of the damage. They brushed off several small rocks and dusted her off. Together, they X-rayed her bones. "No fractures seen", Clark said. "I guess it's ok to move you."

Carefully, they rolled her body onto its back. Chloe used one arm of Clark's body to brush away stones while he used the other to turn her body over. As they rolled her body, nausea hit them like a ton of bricks. They fell towards her body, legs unable to hold them. Pain ripped through her muscles; it felt as if the blood was boiling in her veins.

Chloe looked at Clark in their shared room. He was the tree again, but the tree was being blown by hurricane-force winds, and the leaves were falling off. She looked a second time, and he was Clark again, but a Clark going fuzzy around the edges, and actually starting to dissolve in front of her.

"Clark!" she screamed.

"It's kryptonite again!" he choked out. "It must have been under your body and we exposed it!" His mental form collapsed, mirroring his physical form.

Chloe retained consciousness and will, despite the sufferings of Clark's body. She looked quickly around her. She saw two glowing rocks near her body. With her last ounce of strength, she grabbed the rocks and tried to throw them far away. Her palms burned. The pain made her hands fall. Her hands, containing the glowing rocks, brushed against her body. Then the terrible pain in her hands diminished as she cast the rocks as far away as she could. They shattered against the cave wall. She saw the fragments about eight feet away, and they had stopped glowing. She heard a tremendous whooshing noise in her head. Then it stopped, and the pain in Clark's body grew less.

"Clark? Clark?" she called out in their dark room of consciousness. "Where are you, Clark?"

Suddenly Chloe realized that the feeling of crowding was gone. She lifted up her arm – no need for negotiation for control of the body anymore. She stood – no trouble.

"Oh my God, where is Clark?" she thought. She didn't want to admit, even to herself, that he might be unconscious or dead. "Clark! Clark!" she called out, both mentally and physically.

A rustle nearby attracted her attention. Her body trembled, and its head lifted. "I'm right here, Chloe", her body said weakly. "And I have a headache again."

"Clark?" she said incredulously, looking at her body.

Her body looked down at itself, then looked at her. There was a long moment of silence. "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Toto", it said. It sat up.

"Oh man, what is this? We just get oriented to being Clark when suddenly it's the old switcheroo!" Chloe said. Clark looked dazed and didn't reply.

"I am not going to panic here. I am not going to panic here." Chloe told herself stoutly. "I can handle this. OK, it's totally crazy, it's more body-switching, it's Smallvillian. I can handle this. I can handle this. Positive visualization, Chloe. I can handle this."

She spoke out loud. "How are you feeling?" she asked Clark. It was very disconcerting to be talking to herself, really, but from the outside.

"Well, I have a terrific headache, my muscles are really stiff, my mouth feels like the Sahara Desert, and I have bruises everywhere", Clark said slowly.

"Let me help you", Chloe said. She rushed for Clark's backpack and saw the remaining water bottle was full. She brought it back to him (to herself!) and opened the cap. He took a short drink, swished it around his mouth (_my mouth!)_ and spat it out. A considerable amount of dust came out with it. Then he took a longer drink and swallowed it.

"That's better", he said. He gave a grimace of pain as he shook his head. He took another drink. "Are there any sandwiches left?"

Chloe checked the backpack. There were two crushed PB&J's still in their baggies. She offered him one and took the other herself. They sat next to each other on the cave floor. Neither said a word as they ate the sandwiches and shared the water bottle.

A short time passed. Chloe felt Clark stealing sidelong glances at her and looked back at him openly.

"This is a fix", he said.

"Why does this kind of stuff always happen to us?" Chloe asked plaintively.

Clark broke out a little smile, but gave it up. It seemed to hurt his head.

"All part of the game when you play with space aliens, Sullivan", he said softly. "Think of it as material for the Wall of Weird."

"Well, we've got to figure out some way of reversing this!" Chloe exclaimed.

"Can I just get a wash first?" Clark said tightly.

Chloe realized in shame that he must be in a lot of pain. She was in Invulnerable Clark's body and he was in Fragile Chloe body. She didn't know how she would feel if rocks dropped on her and she had been lying in one position for hours, but suspected she would feel like crap. _I'm stronger right now; it's up to me to do something_, she thought. He smelled pretty bad, too.

"New plan, Clark", she said in a cheerful tone. "I take you back to the farm and we get cleaned up. Then we can work on a plan of attack."

"Good plan, Chloe", he agreed, his voice trailing off. Alarmed, Chloe saw her body falling over as Clark slipped into unconsciousness. She caught her falling body and lifted it.

_I could get used to this super-strength thing_, she thought irrelevantly, as she stooped to pick up Clark's backpack. Her own body was still wearing the light daypack that she had brought to the caves originally. She headed toward the cave entrance.

Chloe held her body close to her chest. A steady heartbeat and regular breathing reassured her. The bright morning sunlight accentuated her body's pallor and made the bruises stand out. She walked at normal-human speed towards her car. It was amazing, really; she could hold her body as easily as she could hold a pillow although she knew she was carrying over a hundred pounds.

She braced Clark against the door of the car and reached into her daypack. She could hear the jingling and located her car keys by feel. She looked at her body again, and then went to the trunk and pulled out an emergency blanket. She opened the passenger door and put the blanket on the seat, then Clark on the blanket. She seat-belted him in (_don't want any damage here, thank you_) and then took her place in the driver's seat. It was uncomfortable for a moment until she was able to push the seat back to fit her new height. She had to adjust the mirrors too. She turned the key, and drove to the Kent Farm.

By the end of the five-mile drive, her body was stirring in its seat. "Chloe?" Clark asked. "Where are we?" He still sounded dazed. _I hope he doesn't have a concussion_, she thought.

"We're turning into your driveway", she reassured him. She parked the car, undid his seatbelt, and picked him up. She could hear frantic barking in the background. _Oh hell, _she thought. _Nobody fed Shelby last night and he's been locked in the barn for almost 24 hours. _She opened the barn door as she continued to walk to the house, carrying Clark; Shelby came out in a rush, tremendously excited and barking hysterically.

"Shelby needs to be fed", Clark said weakly from her arms.

"I know. You're my first priority right now", she replied.

"Just set me down on the couch", he insisted. "Take care of the animals." He looked ashamed that he couldn't do the chores himself.

"Clark, I will. Let's just get you settled first." Chloe spoke firmly. She carried him up to the bathroom. He was slipping in and out of consciousness, and decided to solve the dilemma by conking out completely.

"OK, Chloe, you can do this", she told herself again. She laid her body down on the bathroom rug and undressed it. She felt a little weird. "Bath or shower?" she asked herself, moving on. "Bath it is."

It was not difficult to lift her body into the tub, but it was difficult to keep it from slipping down. She tried various holds and positions, but in the end concluded that she would have to get into the tub herself and hold her body as she scrubbed it. Fortunately, she seemed to have inherited Clark's fine control over his body; she wasn't crushing the towel bar or breaking bones in her own body as she fumbled around.

She stripped Clark's body. She would be happy to get a bath too; she felt all dusty and gritty. A glimpse of the mirror stopped her in her tracks. It was very odd to look in the mirror and see Clark looking back at her. She was not surprised by his muscular upper body; she had seen him shirtless before, but it was a nice treat to see the rest, although rather disturbing in a way. A groan from Clark in the tub snapped her out of her reverie. She hurried to the tub, climbed in with Clark, and began running the water.

It felt so good to be clean. Once she was in the tub, she was able to hold up Clark and use the shower hose attachment to sluice them both down. _Next time my soul gets ripped out of my body and it's put into a kryptonite-induced coma, I am definitely wanting a catheter and a diaper_, she though. She shampooed both of them, palpating her body's head carefully to feel for any swollen or fractured areas. She could neither feel any, nor see any fractures with Clark's X-ray vision.

Once they were clean, she toweled them off. She laid Clark down on his bed and went through his dresser and closet. She found a terrycloth bathrobe and put it on him. She tucked him in and sat there for a moment, looking at him. Shelby poked his nose in the bedroom door, reminding her of her promise.

Chloe grabbed some more of Clark's clothes – clean boxers, T-shirt, jeans. She dressed and went downstairs. She fed Shelby and he tore into the bowl of dog food, finishing it off in about twenty seconds. She took their dirty clothes and threw them in the washer. Then she went out.

_I said I would do the chores, but I don't know what the chores are_, she thought in dismay. She certainly had the physical strength to do them, but didn't have a clue what to do. _I could ask Clark, if he's awake enough. _She considered her options.

"Well, this is a farm. So there's always manure", she said out loud. Before she got into manure-shoveling, though, she wanted to find out more. She headed back into the house and Clark's bedroom.

Clark was tossing and turning on the bed. He looked semi-awake.

"Clark?" Chloe asked.

"Yes?" he replied dully.

"I have to do chores, but I don't know what to do."

Chloe could see her body's face scrunch up in thought. "The most important thing is the milking", Clark said slowly. "I asked Ben Hubbard to milk the cows last night, because I thought we might be late. But they haven't been milked yet this morning."

"Oh boy, this should be interesting", Chloe said nervously. She had never milked a cow before, had had no intention of ever milking a cow, and had never even thought about the mechanics of cow-milking.

"If I can get to the barn I can walk you through it", Clark said. He tried to get out of bed, but fell back into the blankets.

"You're not ready to go anywhere!" Chloe scolded him.

"We have to take care of the cows", Clark said stubbornly.

"Fine, then!" she said in exasperation. She picked him up and carried him to the cow barn. She set him on some hay bales.

"You've got to get the milking parlor ready", he said quietly.

"Milking parlor?" she repeated incredulously.

"Yes." Step by step, he walked her through the connection of the hoses and tubes. "The cows know their order so all you have to do is let them out and they will come one by one to be milked."

"And then I put on the milking machine?"

"No, first you wipe down the udders and disinfect them. Then you do the mastitis screening. Then you attach the milker. Once they're milked, you hand-strip the last bits out, you put on the teat dip and send the cow out to the pasture. That's the quick version."

"What's the slow version?"

"I'm not even getting into changing the vacuum on the milking machine, or medication withdrawals, or estrus detection, or mastitis treatment, or…"

"Sorry I asked."

The actual milking went well under his careful direction. He was right; the cows did have a definite pecking order and waited in line. They seemed happy to be milked. She was surprised at how much record-keeping was involved, and impressed by the careful attention to sanitation and disinfection.

"Now what?"

"I'll deal with the milk in the bulk tank later on. I'll tell you how to clean the milking machine. Then it's stall-cleaning time."

"I knew manure was going to make an appearance here sometime."

"Hey, it's a farm". Clark smiled weakly. He still looked too weak to stand.

She came to the stalls and grimly began pitchforking out the soiled straw. "Why don't you do that at super-speed?" Clark asked her.

"Good thought!" she replied. "How do you get into super-speed anyway?"

"I just think about it…" his voice trailed off.

"Unfortunately, when we were, um, _sharing,_ you didn't pass me that information. I think I need direction."

Clark looked pensive. "Yes. I did sort of grow into my abilities. I don't know if they come "fully assembled, batteries included" with the body, or if you have to learn them."

"Unfortunately again, I think it's the latter". Chloe said in frustration.

"Well, all you can do is try."

She felt frustrated, worried, and angry. "OK, let me start with running, since you seem to do that a lot", she said snippily, then headed towards the barn door.

"Chloe?" Clark said from his position on the hay bales.

"What?"

"I think you can do it." He gave her the famous Kent smile, strangely Clark-like despite appearing on Chloe's body's face. She felt ashamed of her snippiness and also strangely uplifted. She smiled back.

She stood outside in the sunlight. _OK, what's the downside here? I try it, I get superspeed, then I can finish the chores and get Clark back to bed. If I don't try it, I finish the chores, it just takes longer, and I get Clark back to bed. Nothing to lose here. _

She started running. She circled the barn. So far, no super-speed. However, Clark's body was in impressively good shape; she wasn't even breathing hard. She circled again, and tried to think of going faster. She had a feeling of being on the brink. It was like knowing you were going to sneeze, feeling the sneeze coming, but it was working its way up to your nose. She encouraged the feeling, not really knowing how she was doing it.

Suddenly the strange feeling reached some sort of culmination. She was doing it! The crops swaying in the wind became motionless. The world took on a red tinge. The cows in the field were statues. She sped back into the barn and saw Clark sitting on the hay bales. She zoomed up to him and somehow (_how did I do that anyway? But I can feel what to do now)_ dropped out of super-speed.

His eyes widened as she appeared in front of him, apparently out of thin air. "So that's what it's like", he murmured.

"I think I got it", she announced unnecessarily.

"That's good", he said weakly. Chloe was alarmed at his (_her body's!)_ pallor and general look of illness. _Got to finish this ASAP_, she thought. She supersped through the stall cleaning and put down new straw. At Clark's direction, she took care of the calves and the horses.

"What about the pigs?" she asked Clark.

"With my Mom being a Senator this year, we had to cut back on the animals – we got rid of the pigs and chickens and we're only milking forty head this year."

"Only forty head", she said dryly.

"That's really not all that many", he replied. "And it's winter so we don't have to worry too much about the crops or the vegetable garden. Actually, usually I spend a lot of the winter time on maintenance."

"Is there anything else I should be doing right now?" she asked him.

"No, we're pretty much set till the evening milking", he replied. He looked bad – he was pale and trembling.

"Clark, I've got to get you to bed!" she said, alarmed.

"I could go for that", he mumbled. She swung him up in her arms and sped to the house. She laid him back in his bed.

"Thanks, Chloe", he said blurrily as she tucked him in. Then he was asleep.

_What now?_ She asked herself. _You're an investigative reporter. Why don't you go and investigate? What did this to us? How can we reverse it? _A thin smile twisted her lips as she realized she was using her training in asking the "5 W's and H" – who, what, where, when, why, and how.

_Well, we know who. We know when and where – the caves. We don't know what, why, and how. Maybe I should check things out at the caves. _

The thought spurred her to action. She scribbled a quick note to Clark and went outside. She looked at her car and realized she didn't need it. _Maybe Clark will_, she thought. She went back inside the house and left her car keys near the note.

Running was great. Clark was so tall and had such a long stride, it felt effortless to run, and that was even before the super-speed. Again, she ran, and again felt the strange feeling that she now knew was the onset of the Kryptonian powers. She slipped into superspeed easily, gently. It was intoxicating, really – this feeling that she could do anything. But Chloe backed away from the seductive feeling. _These are Clark's powers, not mine_, she thought. Even during the rush of power she knew that it was not her destiny, that she should not try to retain this feeling.

The cave entrance beckoned her. H_ave to be careful here,_ she thought. _There is kryptonite and no one here to help me. I have to go slow. _She stepped carefully through the entrance. She looked around, then slowly moved to where they had been. She looked where her body had been lying, with regular vision and with X-ray vision. Nothing there. She scanned a wider radius, and thought she saw a slight glow. She moved a little closer – the glow brightened, and she began to feel nauseated. _Definitely kryptonite_, she thought, as she moved back. The glow appeared to be coming from several tiny shards of rock. She moved to a different angle and looked at the same spot. She could see a second glow, about 20 feet away from the first one. This glow looked different – it didn't have the evil green color that she was coming to associate with pain and nausea. It looked blackish.

She moved closer to the black glow. Like the green glow, it was coming from several small shards of rock. As she neared it, she didn't feel the nausea she was coming to expect. She wanted to pick the shards up and look at them. Then her common sense kicked in. _Maybe I shouldn't get all that close to it, given my situation_, she thought. She backed away, and checked the rest of the cave where they had spent their unwilling afternoon and night. She didn't find any other kryptonite, either by looking or by walking around and feeling for changes in her body.

_This probably is significant, but I don't know how to interpret it_, she thought. "Maybe Clark knows something", she said out loud. Feeling as though she was missing something, she exited the caves and sped back to the farm. She didn't want to leave Clark alone for too long.

Chloe looked in on him. He was curled up in bed, sleeping deeply. She had gotten used to being in Clark's body, but still felt odd looking at her own. Clark gave out a little snorting sound, and turned restlessly on his side. Chloe looked at him for a moment more, then went downstairs.

She checked out the refrigerator. On the door, under a "Smallville: Meteor Capital of the World" magnet was Martha Kent's schedule for the weekend. It was frighteningly busy. Despite the legislature being off from Friday through Monday, Martha had her entire weekend scheduled with breakfasts, lunches, and dinners; meetings with possible donors; speeches to give; and events to attend. Chloe looked at the Saturday evening time blocks. "Dinner at Union Restaurant – election campaign workers – 5:00 pm"; then "Metropolis Opera Theatre – Luthor Box – 8:00 pm".

_Another reason not to bother Mrs. Kent_, Chloe thought. The last thing they wanted to do was attract any more attention from Lionel Luthor. She stared off into space for a moment. It was hard not to panic again. Chilling thoughts of being trapped in Clark's body forever ran through her brain. _Not that it's totally bad, but it's just not who I am_, she thought. _We've got to get this taken care of. _ She went up to Clark's bedroom and watched him some more.

_Maybe if I lie down next to him…_she thought. Visions of soul transference happening due to propinquity danced through her head. She didn't really think that would work, but stretched herself out next to Clark anyway. Before she knew it, she fell asleep.

She awoke with a start. It looked to be mid-afternoon by the sun. She was holding Clark in her arms and he was warm. Not only that, he was awake, and was looking her in the eyes. She felt a little dazed.

"Uh, how are you feeling?" Chloe said awkwardly as she got out of bed.

"A lot better", he replied. Silence lingered. Apparently neither of them were going to discuss sleeping together.

"Yeah, your bruises look a lot better", she agreed. "I don't remember me healing that fast when I got hurt."

"I'm a fast healer", Clark said shortly, as if he didn't want to talk about it.

"OK", she said, respecting his unspoken hints. Changing the subject, she said, "Clark, while you were asleep, I went back to the caves."

"What? What did you find?"

"I went back to the chamber where we were. There wasn't anything there except for two pieces of kryptonite – I think."

"You think?"

"Well, one piece had the green glow and I felt sick around it. The other piece, I didn't get sick around, and it looked black."

Surprise, then understanding, crossed Clark's face. "I know!" he said.

"What?"

"I think I know how this happened to us. It's the black kryptonite."

"Black? Black kryptonite?" Chloe queried. "I know about the red and the silver…"

"You remember back when Lex was split into two? Good and evil Lex?"

"How could I forget?"

"It was the black kryptonite that did it. It splits you. There was one other time…" he trailed off. Chloe looked at him in curiosity.

"One other time?" she asked.

He seemed reluctant to answer.

"Please, Clark…"

He sighed. "Do you remember the time I was missing for three months and my dad was in a coma?"

"Yes." She was dying to ask more but knew that he had to tell the story in his own way.

"Well, Jor-El took me and split my personality."

Chloe smiled at the description of one more totally weird thing happening to Clark Kent. _Only him_, she thought.

"No, really! I was Kal-El and I was totally Kryptonian. Then underneath I was Clark Kent. I don't remember being Kal-El all that much. My mother used black kryptonite and it brought me out of it. She told me later about it all. Then, when I saw what happened to Lex with the black kryptonite…"

"But if black kryptonite splits, why were we _together_ in your body?"

"I don't know. I think it might have something to do with having both black and green kryptonite together."

"That's a stretch."

"Do you have any better ideas?" He snorted in irritation.

Well, actually, no, she didn't have any better ideas. "So you think we should go to the caves and touch both our bodies with black K and green K at the same time?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess so."

"That's going to be tough for me in your body. Now I know what the green K feels like." She remembered when Clark was under Simone's hypnotic influence and she had stopped him from killing Lex by using the green K on him. Not only that, she had put it in his jacket pocket. In retrospect she realized how painful this must have been.

"I'm sorry for ever using kryptonite on you in the past", she confessed. He looked at her, quirking his eyebrow. "When you were hypnotized, and trying to kill Lex?" she said.

"Well, it wasn't too much fun, but you did save me from killing Lex, so I guess I have to thank you." He looked a little shaken too. "Let's not talk about that any more."

"Right."

Clark shook his head. "I'm in your body now and it's not affected by the kryptonite. We'll go to the caves, you point out where the K is, I'll pick it up, and then we clasp hands." He gave her a challenging look.

"OK." She wasn't keen about facing the kryptonite again, but was even less keen on staying Clark Kent.

They went outside, and with a silent glance of agreement, got into her car. Chloe thought about super-speeding back to the caves, but decided that having the car had saved their bacon before. _We might need it again; who knows what's going to happen?_

At the caves, she led Clark to the two spots where she had found the kryptonite. He had brought some tongs from the kitchen gadget drawer, and carefully picked up a shard of black K. She pointed him towards the green K but didn't go near it herself. He picked up a small piece of green K and walked to the middle of the cave.

"OK, on the count of three, I'll drop the black K from the tongs into my hand. You come here, we grab hands, and see what happens," Clark said tensely.

"OK." Chloe replied. She waited at the edge of the kryptonite influence. She felt a little nauseous, but it wasn't too bad if she stayed a certain distance away. She worked up her courage to go nearer and face the pain.

"One…two…three!" She took several rapid strides and grabbed Clark's hands.

Pain! Her hands were burning, her stomach churning. Her muscles weakened and she fell to the floor. Clark managed to keep hold of her hands. Then there was a tiny fluttering, an indescribable feeling of her soul being gently separated from her body, but then settling back down. She cried out and pushed Clark away. He backed off.

Chloe's agony subsided as he moved farther away. Shakily, she sat up.

"It didn't work," Clark said in disappointment.

"I did feel for just a moment there, that it was going to", Chloe said weakly. "I could feel my soul moving…" she trailed off. She really didn't know how to describe that strange feeling.

"Me, too", Clark said softly. "Maybe we could try it again?"

_No way_, was Chloe's initial thought. She didn't want to go through that pain again. Then she considered her options.

"OK", she said, slowly. Clark looked at her.

"I understand, Chloe", he said. "I think you're pretty brave." He smiled at her. "I know what it's like."

He did know, she realized. She wondered again how he had been able to stand the pain when she used K on him in the past.

"Just let me get my breath here", she said. She rested for a few moments and knew that she had to do it again before her courage ran out. "Let's go."

"One…two…three!" Again their hands met. Again there was the kryptonite agony. And again, there was that small flutter, that slight uprooting of the soul. But not success.

"Chloe, are you ok?" Clark said, standing over her. Obviously he had ditched the kryptonite, because his presence wasn't hurting her.

"Aargh", she mumbled. Slowly the effects wore off. She looked up at Clark. He looked concerned – and disappointed. "I don't want to do that again", she mumbled.

They sat in silence for a moment, then an idea came to her.

"You know, Clark, I think we're on the right track here." She got a calculating expression on her face.

"What?"

"Well, do you remember the rocks on my body? The first time?"

"Yes."

"They were bigger. Maybe we need K-rocks of a certain size to make this work. I mean, I can feel my soul 'moving', so I think we have the right idea with using both kinds of kryptonite together. Maybe we just need more power."

Clark sat there and considered her statement. She could see his face and almost follow his progression of the idea.

"Like in 'This is Spinal Tap', where we need the dial that goes up to eleven?" Clark said.

Chloe smiled at the memory. "Yes."

"That sounds reasonable to me. The problem is that, the bigger the piece of K, the more painful it is to me – to you – and the farther away its influence extends. Inverse square law."

Chloe didn't want to think about that, but said, "We'll just have to deal with it." Then she realized something. "Another problem – we can find the green meteor rock anywhere, but what about the black K? I've never seen it before. All we have here in the cave are shards. I must have shattered it against the wall when it happened the last time."

Clark looked intent. "I think my mother has a piece in a box at home", he said. "Let's go look for that."

They exited the caves. Driving back home in her Bug, Chloe looked at Clark. He looked determined.

Purple clouds floated in the western sky as twilight neared. They came back to the Kent house. "Before we do any more kryptonite experiments, it's time for a pit stop and some food." Chloe said.

"We'd better do the afternoon milking too," said Clark.

They called the cows in from the pasture, milked them, and fed them. After taking care of the calves and horses, Chloe looked at Clark again; he nodded, assuring her that the animals were taken care of and they could address their own problems.

"Bathroom break and dinner next. You can use the bathroom first", Chloe said magnaminously. "After all, ladies first!"

"Gee, thanks", Clark said sourly. He went in. She heard the usual sounds, then silence. Then he called out, "Chloe?" He sounded a little panicked.

"What, Clark?"

"There's some…bleeding…here!" He came out of the bathroom looking flustered.

It hit her. "Clark, didn't I tell you that it was that time of the month?" She laughed out loud at the consternation on his face.

Twenty minutes later, as they ate some dinner, she was still laughing a little bit.

"You take that smile off your face, missy!" Clark said.

"Sorry, I just can't help it."

"Well, as a guy, I never really wanted to learn all this feminine hygiene stuff." He looked embarrassed and disconcerted. "I mean, it's definitely too much information."

"Hey, let's not talk like that about girl parts! What I want to know is, how do you guys handle this…this…dangling participle? It's in the way all the time."

"You get used to it", he said shortly. "How do you girls handle the whole bra thing? I mean, it's pretty uncomfortable."

"Oh, and that was one of my nicer bras!"

Clark blushed and she took pity on him. "Sorry, Clark. But maybe you'll have a little more sympathy for us when we're PMS-ing or OTR."

"OTR?"

"On the rag."

He blushed harder. "You know, Chloe, speaking of things that can never be unseen…"

"OK, we're just leaving this topic right where it's laying… we're not talking about it…"

"That's fine with me, except for one thing – I have an ache…down there."

A long look at Clark. "It's probably cramps. I always get them. Just take an Advil."

Clark stomped away to the medicine cabinet. "How do they stand it?" she could hear him muttering.

He came back. Chloe could tell that now he was task-focused.

"Let's find the black K rock", he said. She followed him to a kitchen cupboard, and watched as he took a small box out of the back. He opened the box and his face fell. She looked – the box was empty.

"I know it was here before!" he said tensely. "What happened to it?"

Chloe had a sudden bad feeling. "Uh, Clark, I think I know."

"What?"

"Remember when you were going to kill Lex and I pulled the green K on you?"

"Yeah…"

"I didn't want to leave it at Lex's in case he got any ideas or information. So I brought it back here."

"But I drove you home in the truck and didn't feel it – did you have it with you then?"

"Yes, but I threw it in the far end of the bed of the truck. It must have been far enough away from you that you didn't feel it. Then I brought it in here. I asked your mom if she had a place for it."

"And?"

"I saw her pull out this box. I thought it was empty, but I saw her dump whatever was in it into the trashcan. Later on I came back with my own box and picked up the piece of green K."

Clark stood stunned for a moment. Chloe felt empty. This was the end of their hopes. Maybe they could gather up the shards of the black K in the cave? Would that be enough to return them to their bodies?

"I wonder why she did that", Clark said softly.

"Maybe she thought it was too dangerous to keep around?" Chloe ventured.

"Maybe", Clark said. "But it doesn't solve our problem right now."

"So, let me see. We need both green K and black K to try out our theory. We have green K –"

"I have a large piece in a box in my barn loft", Clark interjected.

"—but we don't have any black K and don't know where to get any. Except maybe for those shards in the cave." Chloe felt glum.

A figurative light illuminated Clark's face.

"You have an idea", Chloe said.

"Yes. Did I ever tell you how Lex got reunited?" he said.

"No."

"Well, it's a long story, but he was wearing a green K ring. I used my heat vision on the green K and it turned black. Both Lexes were there and touched the ring. That reunited them."

"So, I just need to turn the roaster on the green K?"

"Yep."

Chloe sat still for a moment. "There's only one problem."

"What?"

"Heat vision is one of the things you didn't teach me when we were, um, sharing."

"It's not that hard. You just…" Clark looked disconcerted again.

"What?"

"This is embarrassing."

"What?"

"Well…when I first got my heat vision….it was brought on by thinking of…"

"Sex?"

"How'd you know?"

"Remember when you had amnesia?" Chloe considered that phrase for a moment, then burst out laughing. Clark started laughing too.

"No, strangely enough, I forgot that!" he choked out. They both roared for a few minutes, and the tension was broken.

"Well, you did display all your powers in front of me", Chloe admitted. She had never told him this before. "You saw Lana and burned up a lamp in the Talon."

"So you knew back then?" Clark's face sobered and he was quiet.

"That was back when I was waiting for you to tell me – I was covering for you!"

He looked at her again. "So that's what you meant when you said that 'You trusted me.' I always wondered what you meant by that. But how could I ask you? How did I ever deserve a friend like you? You're great, Chloe."

They looked at each other in silence for a moment. Neither wanted to bring up what they had to discuss. They avoided each others' glances.

Chloe cast around the living room for something to defuse the awkward moment. She went to the music player, opened it, and saw a disc inside. "Gershwin: Porgy and Bess - Highlights". _Martha must have been listening for tonight's opera. _She pushed "Play".

_"Summertime…and the livin' is easy…Fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high…" _ Leontyne Price's soprano filled the room. _Hush, little baby…don't you cry._

"So, your Mom's at the opera tonight?" she asked Clark, once again avoiding the topic.

"Yeah. She always liked opera but was never able to go to the Metropolis Opera Theatre before – it was too far, and the money was always tight. Now she's a senator, and stuff like this is kind of expected."

"I saw her schedule – she's so busy!"

"Yeah, even I can't believe it. She's a senator, and she's in the Smallville Chorale, and two women's clubs, and volunteers at the food bank. When I was a little kid she was President of the PTA for a few years, and she was a classroom mom for awhile too, and a Cub Scout Den Mother. Plus she did all the cooking and did all the business stuff for the farm."

"How did she do it all?"

"God knows. I couldn't do all that even with super-speed." A pause. "My Dad was in the Rotary Club and some other things too, but he spent most of his time on the farm. Between the two of them, they probably knew everyone in Smallville."

"Yeah." Chloe was silent. This was the first time she had heard him mention his father since Mr. Kent passed away. She saw a look of resolution on Clark's face and thought to herself that it reminded her of Clark's dad. Mr. Kent had never been one to let things slide. She suspected that Clark was remembering his father's resolve. Clark sighed and avoided her gaze once again, then looked at her straight on.

Chloe sighed and got back to the topic they'd been avoiding. _Got to deal with the embarrassment sometime. _"So, to use this heat vision thingy, I have to think about sex?" Chloe demanded.

"Yes. It started where I'd think about sex, and my eyes would itch and burn, and then the heat would come. Later on I learned to control it."

"Well, talk about too much information." She suspected there was more to his phrase "learned to control it" than she wanted to know. More silence.

The opera music continued in the background. _"One of these mornin's…you're goin' to rise up singing…then you'll spread your wings, and take to the sky…But until that time… there's nothin' can harm you…"_

"Chloe, it's our only chance—"

"You have to help me." She said it flatly.

"What?"

"I can't do this alone."

"You mean, you want me to use your body…"

"Yes." Then after an awkward pause, "After all, I'm using yours."

He backed away. "That's different", he said.

In the background, the music went to the next track. _Listen to yo' daddy warn you…'Fore you start a-travelin'…Woman may born you, love you, an' mourn you…but…a woman is a sometime thing…a woman is a sometime thing. _

Chloe felt angry. "What's different about it?" she demanded.

"Well…" he trailed off.

"Clark, let me get this straight here." Her voice was thin and clipped. "We need black kryptonite to get back to normal. The only way we can get black kryptonite is to use your heat vision to transform the green K into black. Since I'm in your body, I have to use the heat vision."

"Right so far."

"I don't know _how_ to use the heat vision."

"You learned how to super-speed without my teaching you."

"That was just muscle memory."

"And so is this!"

"No, I don't think so. You said yourself it's associated with sex. How? In what way? Is it just going to happen?"

"I don't know. It just happened with me."

"So what am I supposed to do here?" Chloe said angrily. "Just start playing with myself and hope it turns on? We're in this together and we have to get out of it together!"

Clark looked extremely uncomfortable. "Chloe…" he began.

"What!" she almost screamed out.

"I'm sorry, Chloe. I don't really know how to talk about this…"

She pushed down her anger but it came out in her clipped tones. "Just say it."

"I don't know where to start. There's all these things. Firstly, I don't just want to use you."

"Well, that's the way it's working out, Clark", she said shortly.

"And the safety issue – when I was getting my heat vision, I started some fires I didn't mean to…."

Some unexplained mysteries became clear at last to Chloe. She gulped and said nothing.

"And then the whole thing about being in each other's bodies…"

"We'll give each other permission", she sniffed.

"But, I mean, it's all the same things I've worried about but now they're on your side. I haven't had sex with anyone as an alien yet. I don't, I didn't know if I would hurt anyone when I did. If you're using my body and you don't really know how to control it yet, and you're with me in your body…I just don't want your body to get hurt."

"Oh, yes, there's that", she agreed quietly. Her anger died down a little as she realized what he had worried about for months. In the background, the music continued. _Don't you never let a woman grieve you...Just 'cause she got your weddin' ring…She'll love you and deceive you, then she'll take your clothes an' leave you…Because…a woman is a sometime thing…yes, a woman is a sometime thing._

"You're not over Lana yet, are you?" she demanded harshly.

He looked away from her. He swallowed, and moved slightly back. It was obvious he didn't want to answer.

"No", he said softly.

"I'm just the number two girl! I'm just good old Chloe, just always there, no one special! To her horror, she found herself bursting into tears. She felt so inferior. "How could anyone love me?"

"It's not like that at all!" he protested, coming to her and standing by.

She cried harder.

"I do still have feelings for Lana", he admitted quietly. "But I have feelings for you as well." He took her hand in his.

"Right", she said sarcastically, sniffling.

"I do care about you, Chloe", he said earnestly. "You're strong and true and good. You've always been there for me. I'm the one who's let you down before."

She cried harder at this, somehow, and he ended up hugging her.

"You're not my number two. Being with you is such a gift!" he continued, trying to convince her. "I can be myself with you like I can with no one else. I care about you an awful lot, Chloe."

"Really?" she said, choking the word out between the sobs, hardly daring to hope.

"I do care about you, Chloe", he said quietly. Lately I've wondered how you could stand me. I haven't been a very good friend to you recently. You try to tell me things and I don't listen."

"No, Clark, you are a good friend…" she tailed off into more sobs. Clark gathered her up in his arms. It was funny, now she was so much taller than him, but she laid her head on his chest and cried. Somehow all the anguish of the past two years was coming out now in big racking sobs.

He walked them over to the couch. They sat down, him still holding her as she cried. He patted her on the back. "There, there", he said. She gave a half-laugh.

"What's with this 'there, there' stuff?" she asked, lifting her head from his chest.

"Well, I've always wanted to do that", he said, looking her straight in the eye. "How do you feel now?"

"A little better."

"I know this is a big shock to you. You probably don't feel like investigating the heat vision thing right now."

"Right."

"Let's just sit here and talk for awhile. Get it into your head that I do care for you."

"Right."

Silence for a moment. In the background, the music continued. "_My man's gone now…Old Man Sorrow, come to keep me comp'ny…"_

"Clark?"

"Yes?"

"Do you really mean that?"

"Of course I do!"

She snuggled up closer to him and put one arm around him. "I like you a lot too." Silence. She took her arm away, then realized that he was concentrating.

"I think I have it."

"What?"

"We're both a little worried. Here's the plan: We put up a tent outside and just lay in it and talk for awhile. Let's just be friends together, realizing that it might, and we want it, to turn into romance."

"Why the tent?"

"So you don't burn down the house or the barn."

"Oh."

Clark got up and went to a closet, pulling out a bagged tent. "You gather up some pillows and bedding and meet me out in the side yard." He walked outside.

When Chloe got outside, she saw a small two-man pup tent erected in the yard. She dumped her bundle of sheets and blankets in the tent. Clark was outside, looking up at the sky.

"The stars are bright tonight", she offered, quietly.

He said nothing, but took her hand in his. She got a small realization of the immensity of space, and how lonely he must be at times, being the last member of his species. She couldn't imagine it. She stood next to him in silence for some time, just looking at the stars along with him. He shivered.

"You must be getting cold!" she exclaimed, alarmed. Chloe had not felt the cold (_another good thing about being Kryptonian right now,_ she thought) but realized that Clark, now in her body, would feel it.

"Do you want to go to bed?" she asked awkwardly. He nodded.

They climbed into the pup tent – "two-man" only by courtesy, compared to regular sleeping quarters. The two of them fumbled, bumping into each other, as they arranged their pillows and bedding. "Sorry!" "No, I'm sorry!" Finally, they were both covered, and Clark's shivering grew less as the blankets trapped their warmth.

"Now what?" Clark said, a little nervously.

"Let's just hold each other and talk", Chloe said. So they did.

They spent two hours snuggled up to each other, talking. They talked about movies they'd seen, their favorite books, what it was like working the farm, using the superpowers, the techniques Clark used to deflect attention away from and cover up his secret.

"How do you hide your secret, Clark?"

"After the day my parents told me I was an alien – "

"You mean you didn't know?"

"I always knew I had abilities that were different from other people's, but they didn't tell me I was from outer space until I was fifteen. It was a big shock to me. That was the day I saved Lex from drowning."

"There's more to that story?"

"Chloe, I didn't dive in after his car when it went over the bridge. His car hit me and knocked me through the bridge guardrail and into the water. He was unconscious. I pulled open the roof of his Porsche and pulled him out. I was so freaked out that I wasn't hurt when I was hit by the car. I…talked…to my Dad about it and that's when he told me."

Chloe couldn't imagine finding out something of that magnitude, how it would change one's self-image and worldview.

Clark continued. "I've thought about it every day since."

"Did Lex ever say anything about the ripped-open Porsche?" she asked.

"I found out later on that he had some computer guy reconstruct the accident – he had a whole computer simulation of what happened. It was really accurate, but of course I couldn't tell him that. He's obsessed."

"Do you think Lex knows?"

"He certainly suspects there's something unusual about me. He's been investigating me for years. I'm really worried about it."

"What can you do?"

"Hope for the best. Try not to use my powers where he can see. Lie a lot."

"You're not a very good liar."

"I know. I prefer to do it as little as possible. The first thing I do is just deny that I have a secret at all. _Secret, no, I'm just a regular farm boy! There's nothing unusual about me!_ How can you be suspected of concealing something when there is nothing to conceal?"

"Makes sense."

"Then another thing – if people see me do something unusual, I try to suggest that they're seeing things, or they're drunk, or atmospheric conditions are foggy, or it was so fantastic it really couldn't have happened and they must be crazy, or something like that. Even I'm surprised sometimes at what people can deny and rationalize away."

"Yeah, we humans are really good at lying to ourselves."

Momentary silence. Clark continued, "Then, if people outright ask me a question, I'll answer them back with a question. That throws the ball back in their court, makes them think of an answer, and buys me some time to come up with a story or an excuse."

"I'll have to remember that technique when I'm a reporter."

"You're a reporter already."

"I mean, a Daily Planet, not-in-the-basement, investigative reporter. Go on, Clark."

"Well, if I can't evade or deny or toss it back at them, I'll lie. I don't like to do that because I'm not a good liar and then I'm at risk of being caught in the lie."

"A problem."

"Sometimes I don't want to lie to the person and then my only refuge is silence, or just saying, 'I can't explain my actions'". But that often leads to trouble too."

"Like with Lana?"

Clark was silent for a short period. He continued in a soft voice, "Yes. So many times, inexplicable things happened around me, and I couldn't tell her why. So she thought I didn't care, or was a big fat liar." Chloe knew him well and could discern the anguish under the outwardly calm tones.

"It's hard, isn't it, Clark?" she asked softly.

"Yes." His voice choked in the dark. Then his tone became more resolute. "But if there's one thing I've learned over the past five years, it's that I have to be honest with myself first. Then if I want to be with someone, I have to be honest with them. That's hard."

Silence. Then Chloe said, "Lex has his suspicions. Do you think Lana does too?"

Clark replied, "I'm worried about that, too. When those two Kryptonians came out of the ship during the second meteor shower, she saw what they could do. She's told me she saw them use super-speed, super-strength, and heat vision. She suspects that a ship came down in the first meteor shower –"

"Lana knows _that_?"

"Chloe, it was the most uncomfortable thing. I was talking with her in the loft, and she was talking about the first meteor shower. She deduced there was a ship from the satellite imagery of the trajectories, and asked me, 'Do you think that someone came down in the first meteor shower and has been living among us ever since?' She said that right to my face."

"Little does she know."

"And I'd like to keep it that way."

"Clark, it sounds like she has all the pieces – she just hasn't put them together yet."

"Yeah. In the no-great-loss-without-some-small-gain department, I'm hoping that our breakup will make her so uncomfortable about thinking of me that she won't make the connection."

"Not much you can do about that."

"Just try not to use my powers in front of her, and hope that she doesn't flash kryptonite on me."

They continued their conversation, lying there in the small tent, as the twilight darkened into full night and the stars came out.

"I'm only in the basement now, working on obituaries and fact-checking, but I want to get to the upper floors with the Tiffany lamps." Chloe stretched her calves and feet under the blankets.

"I know you will soon, Chloe."

"I just have to pay my dues, and keep a lookout for stories, and take on more responsibilities…"

"You'll be a great reporter. Heck, you're a great reporter now."

"Yeah, for meteor mutants – something that doesn't get a lot of credence outside of Smallville."

"Maybe that's for the best. Maybe we don't really want to advertise it. Just keep on plugging away, Chloe." Clark smiled.

"Do you remember the time I finally got you to tell all, Clark Kent?"

"How could I forget? Lex got you home from the Yukon, and the first thing you did was come to my barn and pin me down, metaphorically speaking."

"Well, I had seven years of questions all crying out for answers. Although a lot were answered by your dramatic revelation up there in the Great White North. I was only clearing up the details."

"We must have stayed up till 3 a.m."

"I think it was 4 a.m. I was really surprised at how much came out."

"What?"

"How many times you've actually saved me, or Lana, or Pete, or somebody…"

"Well…"

"Clark, you tried to play it down, but I wormed it out of you! You must have done over a hundred saves."

A pause. "Well, Chloe, you saved me too."

"What?"

"When I was getting the Kryptonian stone from Lex's vault, if you hadn't pulled me away from the Kryptonite, I would have died there. And you kept me from killing Lex when Simone had me hypnotized. And you covered for me when I had amnesia."

"Although you don't remember that, strangely enough." She smiled. "I guess we have to stop counting saves now. Let's just be there for each other."

The conversation continued as the stars wheeled above them in the cold winter night.

"What classes are you taking next term? You dropped out this term because of…um…everything, right, Clark?"

"I'm still getting my undergrad requirements – Literature, History, stuff like that. All the freshmen have to take them."

"You probably know most of it already, if you've read every book in the Smallville Library, you giant brain you."

"I've read a lot of books, Chloe, but one thing I have found out is that a good teacher can make the subject come alive and be relevant in a way that no book can do. You've probably found that out too. "

"Yes. I still remember the way to multiply and divide fractions because my fifth-grade teacher was so good about explaining it."

"Something like that. And don't tell me you haven't read a lot of books too."

They talked on and on – touching on her fears of inheriting her mother's mental illness; their regrets for bad decisions, sins of both commission and omission; his fears of losing his lifestyle and freedom if anyone ever publicized his secret.

"I just hope there's a way I can be myself without having to hide everything."

"I hope so, too, Clark."

"It's just…just…if I see someone in trouble, and if I can help them, I have to help them. I can't just…not do anything. Even if I get exposed."

Chloe thought back to the way she had found out Clark's secret. "That's what makes you such a good guy, Clark", she said softly.

As the time wore on, they became more comfortable with each other, and ventured onto previously forbidden topics – his feelings for Lana, her feelings for him, their previous sexual experiences, how freaky it felt to be in a body of the opposite gender. It was awkward, but they were cocooned together, away from the world, and it seemed right to talk. To Chloe, it actually felt more intimate to talk with Clark this way than her first sexual experience had been.

Their talk wound down; there was a little silence. They looked at each other and knew it was time. Chloe began to feel some stirrings of interest. She reached out and caressed Clark. She smiled and said shyly, "Clark, haven't you been wondering of what it would be like to do it from 'the other side'?

He smiled back and said, only, "Yes."

In the house, the opera music, set on indefinite replay, went on. _Bess, you is my woman now… want no wrinkle on your brow, nohow…because the sorrow of the past is all done gone…Oh Bess…Mornin' time and evenin' time and summertime and wintertime…Bess, you got your man. _He leaned over and kissed her. She kissed him back.

Chloe awoke. She was warm and comfortable, tangled up in a pile of bedclothes, her limbs interlaced with Clark's. She stretched and smiled, looking up at the ceiling of the tent. The first rays of dawn poked through several small holes, proof that she had learned how to trigger the heat vision. She didn't want to move; it felt so good to lay in bed with Clark.

Clark woke up. She looked at him; he smiled at her; she smiled back.

"So, if you had sex with a guy and I had sex with a girl…are we gay?" she teased him.

"I don't think this counts", he grinned.

By common agreement, they both got up and started bundling up the bedding. They went back to the house. He went to the bathroom to clean up while she put the bedding in the laundry.

Once again, he directed her through the morning chores and milking. He made breakfast. Then she took her shower and cleaned up. They looked at each other.

"Are you ready?" Clark asked her.

"Yes."

"Let's go outside." He pulled out two lead boxes and preceded her to the yard.

He walked about 10 yards away from her and opened one of the boxes. He pulled out a chunk of green kryptonite and set it down.

She looked at it and, remembering some moments from the previous night, made the mental adjustment that triggered the heat vision. Her aim was off at first, and she burned the lawn next to the rock. Then she got the hang of it and directed her beams towards the green K rock.

"More intensity", Clark said from his spotter's viewpoint closer to the rock. She did – _something _-- and the heat vision was hotter. The virulent green glow faded to black.

"I think we've got it!" Clark said triumphantly. "Are you ready?"

_No,_ was her first thought, _No, I don't want this to end. I love having the powers and Clark has been closer to me than ever before. I want to keep on being strong and fast and seeing things no one else can. _ But then her common sense prevailed. _With great powers come great responsibility_, she thought, _and I'm not ready for that kind of responsibility. _She felt like Sam Gamgee in "Lord of the Rings" turning down the One Ring. Some things that Clark had told her about Jor-El came to mind. _This is not my destiny_, she thought. Then she thought practically, _Besides, how would you explain this at the Daily Planet?_

With a sigh, she said, "Yes."

Clark took the black K in his right hand and the green K in his left. He advanced on her. As he neared, she felt the nausea and pain again; they grew worse as he grew nearer.

"Clark, hurry!" she gasped out as she collapsed. He ran to her and held both her hands, the kryptonite between each set of palms. Nothing happened. She felt sicker.

"Please get away!" she mumbled, losing the ability to speak coherently through the pain. Clark backed off and _Thank God!_ The pain diminished.

After a few moments, Chloe felt much better, and was able to stand. Clark stood some 10 yards away. They looked at each other. Both were crestfallen.

"It didn't work", Clark said glumly.

_Oh God Oh God We're trapped I'm stuck What are we going to do now?_ Chloe clamped her mouth shut. She didn't want to break out into hysterics here and now. She slowly calmed her gibbering mind. An idea came to her.

"Clark, what if we went back to the caves?"

He looked pensive. "That's where it happened before. Maybe there's something in the walls, or something…" he tailed off.

"Nothing to lose", Chloe said determinedly.

Clark put the kryptonite back into its lead boxes. "Better pack some more water and sandwiches", he said.

"Oh?"

"We don't know what's going to happen; we might get stuck in the same situation again."

Chloe considered that. She sped into the kitchen. By the time Clark made it in, a pile of sandwiches had been put into baggies and several water bottles were ready for the pack.

Once again, they drove off to the caves. "I'm really getting tired of this trip", Chloe said. Clark just nodded in agreement.

They stood in the caves, as close as they could to the original site where it happened. Clark backed away and took out the kryptonite.

"Do it, Clark", Chloe said tightly, bracing herself for the pain.

Again he ran towards her, and again grasped her hands with the K between them. This time, through the pain, she could feel her soul uprooting, slipping, moving. She fell unconscious.

When she woke up, she could tell that she was sharing a body with Clark once again – the "crowding" feeling was unmistakable. Once again in their "dark room", she could feel his presence. He seemed to be unconscious. Her head throbbed. _I guess rotten headaches are the price you pay for body-switching_, she thought sardonically.

She opened her eyes and looked. She was back in her own body. _Thank God!_ She looked nearby. Clark's body lay on the floor, _It must be empty if Clark is here with me._ The kryptonite rocks were near Clark's body. She could see the body making little twitches despite its 'emptiness'.

In horror, she ran and picked up the K-rocks. Having experienced the agony of kryptonite poisoning, she couldn't let anyone else suffer from it. As she carried the rocks farther away from Clark's body, he woke up. She stumbled and fell as he tried to assert control over their body.

"Clark, back off!" she said forcefully. She made the mental adjustment to "go inside" and saw him looking at her, holding his head in his hands.

"Chloe?" he said dully. "We're back together?"

"Yes, but this time it's in my body!"

"Your body?"

"This is turning into some sort of stupid joke!"

"Yeah, but we know that at least it works."

Silence for a moment. Then Chloe said, "We have to try it again."

"Yes."

Once again, they went through the laborious process of learning to share a body. It went a lot faster this time. Their experiences over the last 36 hours had forged an unbreakable bond between them.

Soon they gained enough control to walk to the kryptonite rocks and pick them up. "One last time, hopefully", Clark said to Chloe.

As they prepared to advance on Clark's body, Chloe approached Clark in the dark room of their shared consciousness. She touched his soul. In the instant before they were thrust apart, things passed between them.

**Clark I love you**_ I'm an alien, I'm so different _**I respect you more now for having those powers and using them to help people **_Can I ever have a life here on Earth?(vision of telling Lana and her dying, telling Pete and him getting beaten up) _**I love you **_My decisions killed my father _**It's over now, all you can do is live with it **_I don't want you to get hurt I don't want to hurt anyone I just seem to hurt people _**I love you **_(muddled feelings of deep affection, fondness, but not the love she was looking for)_**I love you**_ (feelings of determination to do right, to make up for mistakes, concern that she would get hurt) _**You won't hurt me **_I'm hurting you now by not loving you the way you deserve but don't leave me Chloe please stay friends I can't bear to lose another person I care about _**I'll always be there for you.**

The shock threw them away from each other. She looked at him. They were both breathing hard.

"I just don't want you to get hurt", he said wretchedly.

She sighed, accepting her fate, respecting his wishes.

"Let's go", she said finally.

They held the kryptonite in both hands. They advanced on Clark's body. Again, it made little twitches as they neared it. They reached down and touched the kryptonite to Clark's body.

Chloe's vision darkened. She heard the whooshing noise again. The sense of crowding dissipated. She fell backwards. Again, a terrible headache, but this time she didn't lose consciousness.

"Clark? Clark?" she called out. His body at her feet moaned in answer.

She looked around, saw the glowing kryptonite, and quickly put it in the lead boxes. Then she sat down, exhausted.

Clark rolled onto his back and laid there. He closed his eyes and grimaced in pain.

"Headache?" she asked him softly.

"Yes."

"Me too."

They sat quietly in the cave for half an hour. She took his hand in hers. He sat up and looked in her eyes.

He gave her a farewell kiss. It spoke of the many things about each other that could not be said in words.

They gathered their things, left the cave, and drove home.

**The End**

91


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